I mostly agree with this. Though, I might even be OK with not having tax liability at certain lower income levels, but I think the cutoff should just be zero tax liability. Getting money back is crazy to me.
I got money back last year. Not a lot...I think it worked out everything we paid in plus an extra like...$60. It would have been a lot more back than we paid if we made less money obviously. We got a massive rebate for installing a $$$ geothermal HVAC system. Are you totally opposed to those kinds of rebates?
honestly I'm torn. it felt weird to get that much back, but I never would have installed that kind of system without it, and it is a lot more efficient in the long run so that's a good thing for everybody, right? I dunno. I'm not sure how much I love the entire theory of manipulating people's choies in such a fine grained way via the tax code anyway. Not that it's going to stop any time soon.
Damn, good for you. Even with credits we've never gotten back more than we paid. We've always paid something. I think we're in the same effective rate league as Romney (actually, higher, I think). And that was with one income when DH was unemployed for 9 months.
I think rebates are slightly different, though, because they are meant to encourage behavior that benefits the whole in some way. It still seems like they should result in a zero liability at best, rather than a refund, but maybe there is something I'm not considering. I'm no tax/economics expert.
Post by EllieArroway on Aug 13, 2012 10:56:01 GMT -5
I wish we could simplify the tax code. But, I don't think eliminating capital gains is the way to do it. I have no problem with poor people paying nothing or close to nothing, but I think it's silly that anyone makes money off of taxes (and it happened to me several times while in college).
I would like to see some sort of progressive flat tax implemented, or even just a flat tax across the board but the first $xx are exempt for everyone (maybe twice the poverty rate? I'm just making this up as I go.) No deductions, no loopholes.
I have no idea if something like that would work. But in my head it seems like th solution. Easy and fair for everyone. I have no idea what that rate would have to look like though.
I got money back last year. Not a lot...I think it worked out everything we paid in plus an extra like...$60. It would have been a lot more back than we paid if we made less money obviously. We got a massive rebate for installing a $$$ geothermal HVAC system. Are you totally opposed to those kinds of rebates?
honestly I'm torn. it felt weird to get that much back, but I never would have installed that kind of system without it, and it is a lot more efficient in the long run so that's a good thing for everybody, right? I dunno. I'm not sure how much I love the entire theory of manipulating people's choies in such a fine grained way via the tax code anyway. Not that it's going to stop any time soon.
Damn, good for you. Even with credits we've never gotten back more than we paid. We've always paid something. I think we're in the same effective rate league as Romney (actually, higher, I think). And that was with one income when DH was unemployed for 9 months.
I think rebates are slightly different, though, because they are meant to encourage behavior that benefits the whole in some way. It still seems like they should result in a zero liability at best, rather than a refund, but maybe there is something I'm not considering. I'm no tax/economics expert.
I think the issue with zeroing out rebates like the one I got is that it limits the effectiveness of the rebate for lower earners.
(FYI I'm making these numbers up because I'm too lazy to check our contract. They're in the same ballpark though) My HVAC system cost 35,000. I got 30% of that back from the feds in a rebate. Between that and the fact that I'm a relatively new homehowner in a HCOL area (so BIG interest deduction) - my federal tax liability was entirely wiped out. Now, H and I make decent money - so what we got in the rebate was only peanuts more than what we paid that year. Losing that negligble amount wouldn't have been a deal breaker in deciding to get the system. But a couple who had also saved up that 35,000, but makes much less than we do would not have been able to get the full 30% back because they hadn't paid in that much. So they get less benefit from the program and likely wouldn't be able to afford the more efficient system.
That doesn't seem to jive with the goals of the program.
lols...is there any way to get a reasonable R response on this without causing offense? No, no there isn't. One might almost draw the conclusion that there is no reasonable response. I await being told to fuck off and die for my comment.
I can tell you to go fuck yourself if you'd like??
I honestly think (with the exception of Y4M) that the Cons aren't responding to this because they agree its ridiculous. But why cant they just say, "ok, this is ridiculous". I disagree with the Dems all the time on things, and the Liberal party up here. I'm pretty damn vocal about my criticisms of both parties.
And now, to be all philosophical, THAT is why things don't get accomplished in politics. People are unwilling to criticize their own political party when they should.
LMAO. Are you so full of yourself you seriously think I/we have nothing better to do but open all of these threads and be overcome by the brilliance and genius of the left? I have no problem criticizing any idea I disagree with. That's not a problem at all, at least with this board. The problem here so many of you wouldn't even PRETEND to have an open and honest debate. You (general leftist yous on this board) post snarky "gotchas," try to draw us into reasoning against a false premises, and generally make it obvious that you don't give a shit what we have to say because you've already worked it out that we must "think this" because we "do that". This is a group filled with smart, educated people who should be able to lay their biases against each other aside in order to explain and understand each other. That we can't gives me no hope at all for the rest of the country.
ETA: My apologies for derailing this post. It was just one too many. I'm in a shitty mood today.
Honestly no matter what you do to rich folks, it doesn't make a huge difference in the overall budget. There just aren't enough of them.
I don't know, I've seen at least a handful of charts that suggest that returning to the Clinton tax rates for EVERYONE makes a substantial difference by 2050, which admittedly is quite a while from now, but Paul Ryan's plan also plots out the "Path to Prosperity" as being realized in 2050, so I don't understand why higher taxes are not on the table.
Absolutely--because there are a lot of EVERYONE's and not very many rich people, doing it just for the rich does very little. Repealing for everyone does more, but then you raised taxes on the middle class.
I wish we could simplify the tax code. But, I don't think eliminating capital gains is the way to do it. I have no problem with poor people paying nothing or close to nothing, but I think it's silly that anyone makes money off of taxes (and it happened to me several times while in college).
I would like to see some sort of progressive flat tax implemented, or even just a flat tax across the board but the first $xx are exempt for everyone (maybe twice the poverty rate? I'm just making this up as I go.) No deductions, no loopholes.
I have no idea if something like that would work. But in my head it seems like th solution. Easy and fair for everyone. I have no idea what that rate would have to look like though.
I'm not opposed to rebates and credits to inspire short-term behavior, but I don't like how they seem to stick around long past the behavior is needed.
What would be nice is having this progressive flat tax implemented and have an automatic reset to this every 7-10 years. I'm sure there are reasons this would never work, but I feel like that's what the tax code needs is a reset.
Honestly no matter what you do to rich folks, it doesn't make a huge difference in the overall budget. There just aren't enough of them.
What about Bernie's tax plan...
5.4% surtax on income over a million dollars = $50B annually. (http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=4F353057-535A-4A88-81FC-20AF8751B48D )
$50B might not solve all our budget woes, but having it is better than not having it.
I don't understand the argument that "well, even if you taxed rich people at a high rate, we'd still have a deficit, so we might as well not tax rich people at all." Reducing the deficit somewhat is better than not doing it at all. And reducing the deficit by taxing people for whom the extra tax means not buying another vacation home as opposed to people for whom the extra tax means not paying the electric bill this month makes sense to me.
5.4% surtax on income over a million dollars = $50B annually. (http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=4F353057-535A-4A88-81FC-20AF8751B48D )
$50B might not solve all our budget woes, but having it is better than not having it.
I don't understand the argument that "well, even if you taxed rich people at a high rate, we'd still have a deficit, so we might as well not tax rich people at all." Reducing the deficit somewhat is better than not doing it at all. And reducing the deficit by taxing people for whom the extra tax means not buying another vacation home as opposed to people for whom the extra tax means not paying the electric bill this month makes sense to me.
But if they're buying a business with that money instead of a vacation home, it's a bad thing for jobs and the economy as a whole.
I can tell you to go fuck yourself if you'd like??
I honestly think (with the exception of Y4M) that the Cons aren't responding to this because they agree its ridiculous. But why cant they just say, "ok, this is ridiculous". I disagree with the Dems all the time on things, and the Liberal party up here. I'm pretty damn vocal about my criticisms of both parties.
And now, to be all philosophical, THAT is why things don't get accomplished in politics. People are unwilling to criticize their own political party when they should.
LMAO. Are you so full of yourself you seriously think I/we have nothing better to do but open all of these threads and be overcome by the brilliance and genius of the left? I have no problem criticizing any idea I disagree with. That's not a problem at all, at least with this board. The problem here so many of you wouldn't even PRETEND to have an open and honest debate. You (general leftist yous on this board) post snarky "gotchas," try to draw us into reasoning against a false premises, and generally make it obvious that you don't give a shit what we have to say because you've already worked it out that we must "think this" because we "do that". This is a group filled with smart, educated people who should be able to lay their biases against each other aside in order to explain and understand each other. That we can't gives me no hope at all for the rest of the country.
ETA: My apologies for derailing this post. It was just one too many. I'm in a shitty mood today.
Well, the fact that I was told "go fuck yourself" to me shows exactly why politics is so fucked up. That should never, ever be a response to something. It was completely rude and uncalled for.
I might have been snarky, but I was NOT even sorta close to being as offensive as HAB. That was ridiculous.
Honestly, I think we ended up having some half-decent discussion on the issue despite the derailments.
Simpler, yes, but I think that creates a huge income deficit. Any idea on what kind of income tax void that could potentially create?
Honestly no matter what you do to rich folks, it doesn't make a huge difference in the overall budget. There just aren't enough of them.
I'd actually love to see some numbers on that - because it may have more of an effect than we'd think given that there are many very, very wealthy people in America.
Well, the fact that I was told "go fuck yourself" to me shows exactly why politics is so fucked up. That should never, ever be a response to something. It was completely rude and uncalled for.
I might have been snarky, but I was NOT even sorta close to being as offensive as HAB. That was ridiculous.
Honestly, I think we ended up having some half-decent discussion on the issue despite the derailments.
"I'm not as bad as HAB". that's seriously your response? I'm done.
Honestly no matter what you do to rich folks, it doesn't make a huge difference in the overall budget. There just aren't enough of them.
I'd actually love to see some numbers on that - because it may have more of an effect than we'd think given that there are many very, very wealthy people in America.
What is very very wealthy, income-wise? Top 1% or top .01%?
5.4% surtax on income over a million dollars = $50B annually. (http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=4F353057-535A-4A88-81FC-20AF8751B48D )
$50B might not solve all our budget woes, but having it is better than not having it.
I don't understand the argument that "well, even if you taxed rich people at a high rate, we'd still have a deficit, so we might as well not tax rich people at all." Reducing the deficit somewhat is better than not doing it at all. And reducing the deficit by taxing people for whom the extra tax means not buying another vacation home as opposed to people for whom the extra tax means not paying the electric bill this month makes sense to me.
As for people who are not able to pay their bills, they are probably not paying much, if any, income tax. Even if the wealthy buy a vacation home (how dare they), that's payment to a realtor, to a mortgage broker, to the person inspecting the home, to a contractor, to the furniture company for new furniture, to the gardening service, to the painters, etc etc etc. Think about it, if you got to keep more of your paycheck every month, how would you spend it? Would you invest it, put it in the bank, go on vacation, do home repairs, or something as simple as hiring a babysitter to go to the movies. All of these things are either creating a job or helping to keep someone employed.
I don't understand the argument that "well, even if you taxed rich people at a high rate, we'd still have a deficit, so we might as well not tax rich people at all." Reducing the deficit somewhat is better than not doing it at all. And reducing the deficit by taxing people for whom the extra tax means not buying another vacation home as opposed to people for whom the extra tax means not paying the electric bill this month makes sense to me.
As for people who are not able to pay their bills, they are probably not paying much, if any, income tax. Even if the wealthy buy a vacation home (how dare they), that's payment to a realtor, to a mortgage broker, to the person inspecting the home, to a contractor, to the furniture company for new furniture, to the gardening service, to the painters, etc etc etc. Think about it, if you got to keep more of your paycheck every month, how would you spend it? Would you invest it, put it in the bank, go on vacation, do home repairs, or something as simple as hiring a babysitter to go to the movies. All of these things are either creating a job or helping to keep someone employed.
Right, and if you can't pay your bills, I don't think you *should* be paying much, if any, income tax.
There's nothing wrong with buying a vacation home, but if our country is in a severe debt crisis that needs to be resolved ASAP, the money has to come from *somewhere*, and I personally think it should come from people who have to sacrifice luxuries rather than people who have to sacrifice necessities.
If I get extra money and I put it in an offshore bank account in the Caymans, how is that helping keep people employed?
As for people who are not able to pay their bills, they are probably not paying much, if any, income tax. Even if the wealthy buy a vacation home (how dare they), that's payment to a realtor, to a mortgage broker, to the person inspecting the home, to a contractor, to the furniture company for new furniture, to the gardening service, to the painters, etc etc etc. Think about it, if you got to keep more of your paycheck every month, how would you spend it? Would you invest it, put it in the bank, go on vacation, do home repairs, or something as simple as hiring a babysitter to go to the movies. All of these things are either creating a job or helping to keep someone employed.
Right, and if you can't pay your bills, I don't think you *should* be paying much, if any, income tax.
There's nothing wrong with buying a vacation home, but if our country is in a severe debt crisis that needs to be resolved ASAP, the money has to come from *somewhere*, and I personally think it should come from people who have to sacrifice luxuries rather than people who have to sacrifice necessities.
If I get extra money and I put it in an offshore bank account in the Caymans, how is that helping keep people employed?
Okay, but how many of these real top earners (and to me, you're not talking about just the top 1%, but the top .01%) to actually make a dent?
It is such a frustrating myth that we could solve the debt crisis without cutting spending if we could just get rich people to give up their luxuries.
Lots of data here looking at the Buffet millionaires surtax. Money quote:
So taking half of the yearly income from every person making between one and ten million dollars would only decrease the nation's debt by 1%. Even taking every last penny from every individual making more than $10 million per year would only reduce the nation's deficit by 12 percent and the debt by 2 percent. There's simply not enough wealth in the community of the rich to erase this country's problems by waving some magic tax wand.
It is such a frustrating myth that we could solve the debt crisis without cutting spending if we could just get rich people to give up their luxuries.
Lots of data here looking at the Buffet millionaires surtax. Money quote:
So taking half of the yearly income from every person making between one and ten million dollars would only decrease the nation's debt by 1%. Even taking every last penny from every individual making more than $10 million per year would only reduce the nation's deficit by 12 percent and the debt by 2 percent. There's simply not enough wealth in the community of the rich to erase this country's problems by waving some magic tax wand.
No, it's not enough without cutting spending. But I haven't heard anybody say taxes should be raised *and* no spending should be cut. I think it's only going to be possible with a combination of the two.
But I don't believe that we should *cut* taxes on the rich while raising them on everyone else, while Paul Ryan does.
I also don't think that we can solve the budget problems by cutting spending on Planned Parenthood and the arts and then call it a day.
ETA: actually, do we even still spend money on the arts?
As for people who are not able to pay their bills, they are probably not paying much, if any, income tax. Even if the wealthy buy a vacation home (how dare they), that's payment to a realtor, to a mortgage broker, to the person inspecting the home, to a contractor, to the furniture company for new furniture, to the gardening service, to the painters, etc etc etc. Think about it, if you got to keep more of your paycheck every month, how would you spend it? Would you invest it, put it in the bank, go on vacation, do home repairs, or something as simple as hiring a babysitter to go to the movies. All of these things are either creating a job or helping to keep someone employed.
Right, and if you can't pay your bills, I don't think you *should* be paying much, if any, income tax.
There's nothing wrong with buying a vacation home, but if our country is in a severe debt crisis that needs to be resolved ASAP, the money has to come from *somewhere*, and I personally think it should come from people who have to sacrifice luxuries rather than people who have to sacrifice necessities.
If I get extra money and I put it in an offshore bank account in the Caymans, how is that helping keep people employed?
Taxing the rich, even the Mitt Romney rich, wouldn't put a dent in our debt. It's not the solution. The solution is less spending. If we keep giving Congress money, they will spend it. From Forbes: "If the IRS grabbed 100 percent of income over $1 million, the take would be just $616 billion. That’s only a third of this year’s deficit. Our national debt would continue to explode."
And the reason why Mitt Romney is putting money in the Caymans is obviously to avoid the high taxes rates here. So therefore the solution would be to lower taxes, not raise them.
It is such a frustrating myth that we could solve the debt crisis without cutting spending if we could just get rich people to give up their luxuries.
Lots of data here looking at the Buffet millionaires surtax. Money quote:
So taking half of the yearly income from every person making between one and ten million dollars would only decrease the nation's debt by 1%. Even taking every last penny from every individual making more than $10 million per year would only reduce the nation's deficit by 12 percent and the debt by 2 percent. There's simply not enough wealth in the community of the rich to erase this country's problems by waving some magic tax wand.
But if they're buying a business with that money instead of a vacation home, it's a bad thing for jobs and the economy as a whole.
I think we've already clarified though, that that's not what they're doing. Right? I mean, we're coming up on 12 years of Bush tax cuts and what is the rate of business growth? New hiring? Job creation?
Job creation, per Obama, is quite good---116, 000 last month; 4.5 million since he took office. So, I am not sure this isn't creating jobs (I am also not sure it is).
Right, and if you can't pay your bills, I don't think you *should* be paying much, if any, income tax.
There's nothing wrong with buying a vacation home, but if our country is in a severe debt crisis that needs to be resolved ASAP, the money has to come from *somewhere*, and I personally think it should come from people who have to sacrifice luxuries rather than people who have to sacrifice necessities.
If I get extra money and I put it in an offshore bank account in the Caymans, how is that helping keep people employed?
Taxing the rich, even the Mitt Romney rich, wouldn't put a dent in our debt. It's not the solution. The solution is less spending. If we keep giving Congress money, they will spend it. From Forbes: "If the IRS grabbed 100 percent of income over $1 million, the take would be just $616 billion. That’s only a third of this year’s deficit. Our national debt would continue to explode."
And the reason why Mitt Romney is putting money in the Caymans is obviously to avoid the high taxes rates here. So therefore the solution would be to lower taxes, not raise them.
That's a *third* of the deficit. Isn't that better than, say, zero? Even if it's only a sixth, isn't that better than zero?
Even if we cut spending to zero right this minute - no military, no highways, nothing - we would still have massive debt. We can't cut our way to solvency either.
I don't understand your last argument either. Mitt pays no tax on money in the Caymans, so we should lower our tax rate here? Why? Even if we lowered it to 2%, why would you pay 2% if you could be paying 0%?
Taxing the rich, even the Mitt Romney rich, wouldn't put a dent in our debt. It's not the solution. The solution is less spending. If we keep giving Congress money, they will spend it. From Forbes: "If the IRS grabbed 100 percent of income over $1 million, the take would be just $616 billion. That’s only a third of this year’s deficit. Our national debt would continue to explode."
And the reason why Mitt Romney is putting money in the Caymans is obviously to avoid the high taxes rates here. So therefore the solution would be to lower taxes, not raise them.
That's a *third* of the deficit. Isn't that better than, say, zero? Even if it's only a sixth, isn't that better than zero?
Even if we cut spending to zero right this minute - no military, no highways, nothing - we would still have massive debt. We can't cut our way to solvency either.
I don't understand your last argument either. Mitt pays no tax on money in the Caymans, so we should lower our tax rate here? Why? Even if we lowered it to 2%, why would you pay 2% if you could be paying 0%?
That is if we taxed the rich at 100%. Which will never happen. Do you think that's a good solution? I don't understand your argument. How would raising the tax rate, like the corporate tax rate, keep money in the country? It would force more people not as rich as Romney to keep money in other countries. I do think the corporate tax rate should be lowered to 0%. www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/30/us-corporate-tax-rate_n_1392310.html
That's a *third* of the deficit. Isn't that better than, say, zero? Even if it's only a sixth, isn't that better than zero?
Even if we cut spending to zero right this minute - no military, no highways, nothing - we would still have massive debt. We can't cut our way to solvency either.
I don't understand your last argument either. Mitt pays no tax on money in the Caymans, so we should lower our tax rate here? Why? Even if we lowered it to 2%, why would you pay 2% if you could be paying 0%?
That is if we taxed the rich at 100%. Which will never happen. Do you think that's a good solution? I don't understand your argument. How would raising the tax rate, like the corporate tax rate, keep money in the country? It would force more people not as rich as Romney to keep money in other countries. I do think the corporate tax rate should be lowered to 0%. www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/30/us-corporate-tax-rate_n_1392310.html
No, I don't think that's a good solution. But it's silly to say that doing so wouldn't help because it obviously would.
So you are saying that we should raise taxes on the middle class and poor because they aren't capable of moving their money offshore??