50 years of tax cuts for the rich failed to trickle down, economics study says

If those three are brake pedals only, the ideal situation should be: 0 interest rates, 0 regulations, 0 taxes. Yes or no?

 

Did you read all of it or just the headline? Foreign taxes paid on overseas earning offset in whole or in part US taxes. Oh and That only applies to stocks.

 

That’s a false equivalency, and you know it.

Google is your friend.

Which made our businesses more competitive. Philosophically, I don’t believe we should be taxing domestically produced goods and services at all. We should tax personal income, not business income.

Every first world country in the world controls its borders and enforces its immigration laws.

In progress, but he supported pro-energy policies.

He was proud to sign the sentencing reform bill.

He signed a Phase 1 trade agreement with China last year, and our trade deficit with China is on the way down.

They’re mad because they are accustomed to stealing their own defense from the U.S. taxpayer. Europe has a higher population than the U.S. and a slightly higher GDP. There is absolutely no excuse for expecting the U.S. to defend them as a first option.

So? You are in favor of that ban, aren’t you?

He was not a fan of our forever wars. It will be interesting to watch Biden. Does he go neocon, or does he validate Trump policies by continuing them?

The war against ISIS was being waged with an oppressive amount of White House oversight, slowing the progress of the war under Obama. Trump lifted the burden of that oppressive oversight and told the generals to just win the war as quickly as possible, and they did.

Speaking of my list, I forgot to mention judges. The 3 new SCOTUS judges are “originalist” judges who may be expected to judge cases by the original words of the Constitution, rather than by personal and political bias.

The SC must be non-political, and the Constitution must not be ignored according to our political whims.

Seth

 

Already answered, read my response to AN.

 

There us no such thing as perfect in this world. If human beings were perfect it even perfect able we wouldn't need government at and your ideal would be the norm. Since they are not some level of government and some way to fund that government are necessary.

This is of course self serving horse crap. The Us spends more in a day than Bezos makes in a year.

 

Yeah, you can start by telling the story from the beginning instead of Göbbeling, which is that 50 years of "90%" tax rates didn't "trickle-down" either.

Right? Why did you leave that part out?

Tax brackets were up to 91% when they weren't 90% before JFK reduced them to 70% and you had no "trickle-down."

Right? Because if high taxes were the answer, then there would have been no need for the welfare legislation enacted in 1964 and 1965, right?

 

Good way to wiggle out of the question.

 

my statement stands as fact

 

Yet reality and truth are generally the best.

 

Not hardly it stands as the exact opposite of fact.

 

not when every iota has already been proven a long time ago. US History is chiseled in stone.

 

Except buy his products.

 

I love discussing failed economic policies. So, ... How is California doing?

 

He is not required to buy his products. He can make or grow them himself or buy elsewhere.

 

Nope
Nope
Maybe.

 

Gary, The combined income of my wife and I put us in the lower half of the upper middle class, and that plan would actually raise our federal taxes from 12.8% to 16.8%.

Now if you will bear with me a while, the other thing wrong with that plan is the fact that, after a point, higher and higher amounts of money do not provide important intangibles like security for the present and future, enough money for a home in a nice neighborhood, two cars, and a college fund for your kids, and some fun money for vacations and travel, while staying mostly debt free. After a point, all those very high incomes do is enable more expensive things - bigger houses, fancier things, etc.

Conversely, many studies, as well as the personal experiences and observations of most of us, show that below a certain income, life is harder, more stressful, less secure, and there is far less of the senses of wellbeing and contentment.

So somewhere approaching an upper middle class income there is that transition from stress and struggle to experience the American dream, to actually experiencing it. For lack of a better term, I’ll call that income level the American Dream Level or ADL for short.

Now I’ll get more to the point.

If a household (like a family of 4) has reached a $500k income level, it is clearly living the dream. If you tax them 17%, that still leaves them with $415k which is still far above the minimum ADL. That $85k they paid in taxes doesn’t hurt them. It really doesn’t even touch them. Fortunately for them, they are far enough above the ADL that they don’t even notice it except as a figure on their tax form.

Now on the other hand, you take a family of 4, getting by on $70k. These days, that is not much. You tax them 17% on $35k (because the first $35k is exempt). The tax is $5,950.

Put another way, that’s almost $500 per month.

That hurts. Clearly, for that family, that is serious money, and it is putting them that much further from achieving the ADL, put another way, the happiness and contentment level.

So while the $500k household pays far more dollars than the $70k family, the amount they pay does not do harm, while the amount the $70k family pays does do harm, and therein lies the iniquity of the flat tax ... the amount of harm it does to the high income family vs the lower income family.

I say what I think based on personal experience. I’ve worked for minimum wage before. I’ve counted down to the last dollar in the checking account before a payday. I’ve floated checks so a payment wouldn’t be late. I remember my wife making a huge pan of lasagna, cutting it up and freezing the pieces so we could eat it for dinner for weeks to save enough money to make ends meet. I remember throwing a sheet over a curtain rod because we couldn’t afford curtains, etc, etc, etc.

And I also know what it’s like in the upper middle class with a comfortable home that’s paid for, in a nice neighborhood, 3 vehicles, savings in the bank, and no real financial worries for the present or the future. We actually give away money to various things.

If we made twice as much money, we wouldn’t be any better off on a measure of happiness and contentment. But if we made half as much, our whole lifestyle would have to change, and all of a sudden, $500/month in federal income tax would really hurt.

Simply, when I think about a flat tax, I judge it by what it does to the high income family vs the lower income family.

So I hope I’ve explained myself and point of view adequately.

Seth

 

It is an agreement. They agree to sell and you agree to buy. No one is obligated one way or another.

 

Something tells me you didnt reduce your earnings by 35 k before multiplying. And I doubt seriously if your other write-offs will equal 35k.

 

So you a totally believe Jeff Bezos makes enough money every year to fund the US government for more than about 2 hours or so? By the way what you know about US history that is accurate could be hidden under a postage stamp with room left over for a Micro Copy of War and Peace.

 

You'd rather products had not been available?

 

nanny nanny booboo noted, but, yes, the money accrued by the mega earners on 2020 alone can bash a hole in all our problems. just do it.

 

Again the US government spends ten billion a day no one including Bezos makes more than a fraction of that over the course of a year.

 

No, Gary. I did subtract 35k from our income and then calculated a 17% tax.

Remember, the first $24k of our income is exempt under current tax law. If we change that to $35k, we are only gaining an exemption of $11k over the exemption we already get. But we are going from what turned out to be a 12.8% rate to a 17% rate under the Forbes flat rate idea. That increase in the rate overcomes and surpasses the tax savings we would get by having the $35k exemption. And that’s why my taxes would go up under that plan.

Seth

 

again, nobody is saying Jeff does it alone, get a few guys who own islands and parts of States to pony up in times of crisis ...except for them

 

Moreover, they ALWAYS leave out the massively increased availability of deductions, loopholes in those pre 1982-84 pre IIRC reform days. Those super high brackets were totally meaningless. Wonder why they do that?