Killing the Class-Warfare Argument
 

A recent report from the Treasury Department confirms that the rich are paying a bigger share of taxes than they would if the Bush tax cuts hadn’t passed. The Treasury estimates that the top 1 percent of earners will pay about 32.3 percent of taxes this year, which is the same as the CBO estimate. The Treasury also estimates, however, that absent the tax cuts, the top 1 percent would be paying only 30.5 percent of taxes, down 10 percent from 2001.

http://www.nationalreview.com/moore/moore200408191201.asp

No Comments from the John Kerry Crew. Amazing

None required.

Look up "AMT".

Interesting...

What does the alternative minimum tax have to do with the actual percentage paid? Everyone is paying less, the rich just got a smaller percentage drop. Many who were on the low end don't pay fed tax at all now. Yep, he's a BAD MAN.

Low income people got a $250 tax cut. High income people got $100k tax cut. Who needs the money more?

From the article - this part made me laugh:

The part in bold is laughable - can anyone honestly raise their hand and say that the tax rate is their only disincentive to working harder and making more money?

<i>"Who needs the money more?"</i>

In a free society, it's nobody's business who "needs" the money more. I don't need some government bureaucrat deciding who needs MY money more. I work hard for MY money with no help from the government. The government serves only as a hurdle. I employee several highly-paid engineers due to MY hard work. They, in turn, support their families and live very comfortably.

But on second thought, maybe I should let the government redistribute MY hard-earned money to some low-income people who "need" it to buy cigarettes, cheap wine and Lotto tickets ...... :rolleyes:

Nice try, Kafka. See here in America, it's called free enterprise. People who get an education and work really hard make more money than people who drop out in the 10th grade to buy a Camaro and go to work at Hardee's. All men are created equal, after that it's all about life choices. If you choose to work long hours to get ahead, you deserve to keep that money. Sending money to people because they "need it more" is a nice income redistribution scheme. That doesn't work so hot in the real world (see also: Soviet Union). The top 50% of income earners pay 96.04% of all income taxes in America. When there are tax breaks, who exactly do you think should get them? I think it's the people who actually pay taxes.

-Paul

VAT/Sales Tax. What other fair way is there to tax people?

Now wait a second. . .maybe Cam has something here.

I think that we can all agree that we all/each need our money more than our politicians do. :p

Oh man, Cam; you really stepped in it, on this one.

Yeah Cam, I'm raising my hand here. . ."The part in bold" is spot-on. Who want's to work full-time when part-time will get them by?

Island - not with the same standard of living.

Personally, I only work about 30-40 hours a week at the moment. That is because I am lazy and I have the option. The fact that I face a (top) marginal tax rate of 39% on the additional income I might earn if I work harder is completely irrelevant. I want to have the free time more than I want to earn heaps more income. Even at 39%, the additional tax is not the relevant factor to me.

I'm serious, think about the consequences of a nice fat tax cut for you. The way the world works, if you get it tax money back, someone else misses out. The debate should only be about what minimum standard of living people are entitled to.

To address other, specific comments:

Curt In a free society, it's nobody's business who "needs" the money more.

Its not a free society - in your "free society" you will enjoy all of the glories of true poverty. Its all fine and well to say "if someone needs to eat, they can get a job". Will they? What if they can't through illness? Because they are a teenage mother and have a daughter with no father?

Oh wait, I hear the answer already - she shouldn't have got pregnant. But she did. You want for mother and baby to go without food so you can have a lower tax rate?

drop out in the 10th grade to buy a Camaro and go to work at Hardee's

He's not really the problem. In your low tax utopia, he would probably get by. He'd live in a slum (I assume you'd be taking away any accommodation supplement he needs), but you'd be ok, because you live behind a big fence.

Poverty sucks, and I wouldn't wish it on anyone - whether it is through their own mistakes or not. You guys basically take the viewpoint that it is ok that poverty sucks because that is an incentive to climb out of it. Screw that.

Anyone that is not severely handicapped can be successful in this country if they work hard and make reasonable choices. Sloth and poverty are chosen via free will in this country. Why should we make it any more attractive than it already is. Why punish the industrious and reward the lazy? It does not make much sense to me.

Well said. The dole should exist for those incapable of helping themselves and as a temporary helping hand for people who hit temporary bad times. It has become an unfortunate way of life for people who've figured out the system and exploit it such that they can exist without lifting a finger of their own. This is not right, not fair, not just. Anyone -anyone- in America (with the exception of invalids and a select few others) can make their own successes with nothing more than a minimal work ethic and the desire to do so. Those that choose not to warrant no pity from me.

-Paul

I saw a guy in front of McDonald's the other day. he was holding a "will work for food" sign asking for donations. He was leaning against a sign that said: "help wanted immediately..all shifts...no experience required"

I saw another guy...he was about 25 years old or so. He was wearing an old field jacket and had a sign saying: Hungry-Please help Vietnam Vet..God Bless"...Too lazy to even find out that the war he claimed to be a veteran of happened before he was born....or maybe he was an animal doctor from Vietnam.....

Here is a special guest response from my wife (if you think I'm a lefty, spend five minutes talking to her):

It's Cam back (I was taking dictation) - she is not as reasonable as I am and she is beginning to get ummm, rude.

You guys need to look at statistics more - if the US is anything like NZ, the vast majority of people on the dole (95%+) are not on it long term and are certainly not second generation beneficiaries.

If you reduce the welfare state, you reduce what I personally (and Anna) consider to be basic human rights.

You want to take money from the people in the link below? They are working - will they be any less poor if they work harder?

http://www.nccbuscc.org/cchd/povertyusa/tour2.htm

Ah, Cam, and Anna. that was great. Such a refreshing flash-back to younger naïve days. :)

Point one)
Quite a long time ago, I (with some friends out looking for adventure) saw a guy down by the railroad yard with a nice fire burning. In my great wisedom I said "CAMPFIRE! . . .let get some hot-dogs and marshmellows and go see this guy" (yes we had been drinking)

Well we got quite the education that night. "Ol' Rusty" was setting us staight about the life, and culture of a transient. I can't really put it all in words here, put make no mistake, many transients are "transients just to be counter to "the system." (at least in this country)

Point two)
At one point in my career I took a job with a govt funded "non-profit" org, said to be in exsistnce to bolster the World Health concerns, primarily for women & children of 3rd world countries.

What a sham. I sat in total disbelief as the funding official gave mountains of money (tax-payer money) to projects that he openly admitted had no future. I was dumbfounded when I was instructed on how to mis-apropriate billing.

These two points were pivitol in my understanding the balance of this issue of tax dollars going to fund the "needy"

Please understand that your argument of "taking money away from the poor thru lower taxes" is off base. There needs to be a balance!

Certainly zero help to the truely needy would cause much further hardship to those already having problems. . . but as it exists right now, TAXATION does not lead to relief. Taxation "for the needy" leads to bureaucrat putzing around until they have used up all the money paying themselves, and their friends, or paying any who will kiss ass whilst chasing funded-bone$.

So, before Anna goes telling people, just what their (lacking)perspective is. . .she may be well advised to consider that from where they sit may be just a little less naïve than from where she sits.

btw; my favorite cardboard [feign]cry for help[/feign] sign, that I've seen. ..

"WILL WORK FOR FOOD. . .but this is far easier. :) "

I remember in college I was getting out of my car. A buddy was with me.

As soon as I got out I was approached by a homeless person asking me for $1.00

I stopped for a second and offered the guy $10 to wash my car.

I was told to "f@ck off"

My then girlfriend and I where walking to the movies. Had a bum ask me for $0.10 I would have given it to him if I had it. All I had was plastic. When I turned him down he proceeded to call me a racist and followed us for 4 blocks yelling your a racist.

Fast forward a few years. When I restaurant manager. I would have people coming in with dog crap on their clothes looking for a job. I found out they just wanted to turn in a app so they could say they applied for 5 jobs that week so they could keep the benefits coming in.

Had a waitress that was pregnant. Had social services tell her to stay home because she would make more money to sit at home.

I do not make the mega bucks that many on this site make. I do well enough to let my wife stay home with my child. Had to make some sacrifices to do so but it was important to me. I work on cars on the side to earn some extra money, also work on computers to earn a little extra money.

If you are willing to work you will get by in this country. You may not make enough to buy a new Porsche every year or even a new car but you can get by if you are willing to work.

I resent seeing my tax dollars going to support a bunch of lazy asses

You know, I'm sorry to hear about your unfortunate experiences with that nonprofit, Island. My experiences in government were very different. The people I dealt with were very hard-working and very honest. But they were often ineffective because their offices were tragically, and deliberately, underfunded. This nonprofit in your past was not a public agency. Yet they received grants. Perhaps those grants needed to be tracked more effectively, and audited for performance. But then, that would mean hiring a couple of auditors, total cost of $120k, to ensure that several million dollars of public funds are not wasted. Make sense? Sure it does, to you and me. But to a politician? Heck no! A politician thinks:

"That's 'gubmint spending' and if I get caught supporting it, I'll be defeated in the next election by very angry conservatives. So, the waste must stay. And besides, it makes government operate poorly, and I campaign on a platform of hating government, so this is just more fuel to use in scaring people and making them angry enough to vote for me."

And those of you who think everyone has an outside pony on the Capitalism Carousel, and can reach the brass ring, you're not paying attention. There are horses whose riders cannot reach the ring dispenser. When a liberal talks about freedom, this is party what he's thinking. When a conservative talks about freedom, he's thinking of how we can slam the door in these peoples' faces. After all, we need low wage workers, and we need a LOT of them. I understand what Anna was saying. But some of you do not. For some of you, life is simple. It's as simple as a conservative radio talk show.

Anna,

Every true conservative is more than happy to help those who truly need it. I don't know why this is so hard to understand? Trapping people in poverty by making them comfortable in it is the kind of travesty that should keep you up at night. There is nothing more vile than stealing someone’s dream before they ever had it. That is what our current system does. We tell them they could not possibly succeed and they are better off living on our charity. We said it often enough that many now believe it. Sad, truly sad.

What about the kids?
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1093277155.gif
(OECD and Luxembourg Income Study data.)

Thanks for the graph, Ubiquity.

Lendaddy, you seem really smart sometimes.

Hey Camb: you said "The part in bold is laughable - can anyone honestly raise their hand and say that the tax rate is their only disincentive to working harder and making more money?"

Actually while its not the only disincentive, it certain is one. My wife and I chose to have her stay at home and only work a local 1/2 day job, as opposed to going back to a full time career making a lot more money for several reasons, including teenagers not being home in the afternoon with out adult supervison. However, between Federal income tax, social security, state income taxes, unemployment insurance taxes, disability insurance taxes, gas and sales taxes on the commute, city parking taxes on parking at work, sales tax on buying lunch, and sales taxes on professional clothing, it all added up to the government taking about 50% of what she would gross in our higher tax bracket. That made our decision for her to stay home in the afternoons a lot easier. So actually while not the "only disincentive" it was certainly a major contributor to our decision.

I'm in that bracket. Where's my $100k?

In America, all people are born equal. But that's it. It's from that moment on that makes them different. There are plenty of success stories of people who dropped out of high school, had kids and are now doing quite well. I don't buy any "help the poor through taxes" agument. Proportionally, I will never see the benefits from my federal tax dollars that the lower tax brackets see.

And personally, I couldn't care less about the poor. I studied hard, and now work hard to live in a nice home in a nice neighborhood. And yes, I partied very hard in my early days. I just woke up and wanted some of the finer things. Now I have to help contribute to the poor by giving up more of my hard earned money. Give me a break. I should be rewarded, not punished. I benefit society (assumably). The poor leach off society (no assumption there). Who deserves more rewards - the self sufficent or the leaches?

I like my neighborhood. If the cops see a transient or "the wrong car" in my part of my City, the police will stop and question/arrest or transport out of the City limits. I like it that way. I don't go to poor neighborhoods and I don't want them coming to mine. There is no reason for them to even be there.

I get sick and tired of politicians, Hollywood types and the like, who have ridiculous numbers in their personal bank accounts and beleive that the "rich" should pay more taxes to help the poor.

I would love to see a list of the non-tax deductable donations these politicians have made to the poor in their life. I am confident it would be a short list. All they care about is saying the correct thing to the masses to get elected. As the "rich" is porportionally a smaller voting population, guess which one they will support. It's all BS and the mass magority really don't care if the poor live or die.

Underneath that hard shell is a humanitarian trying desperately to gto out.......

Paul, we're all born equal in the sense of rights and liberties, but that does not mean we are born equal. A person born with an IQ of 70 and a cleft palate is not going to have the same earnings ceiling that you have. One of my favorite things about our economic system is that there can be big winners. BIG WINNERS, in fact. But one of my problems with capitalism is that in order to allow for a few to hit the jackpot, there are going to be losers too. Some will be winners, some will be losers. And for those of you whose brains are in the "off" position, and are thinking that we can all be winners.....aside from noting that at the foundation of our system is a sea of minimum wage workers that the system cannot do without......an eve deeper investigation will uncover the insidious fact that our system requires losers in a broader sense. We love competition here. And that's what capitalism is. It's not a win-win game like some of you have been fooled into believing. It's a win-lose game like most others.

If you've got rose-colored glasses on, you'll call it "englightened self-interest." Otherwise known as "greed."

The world needs ditch diggers, too

And if you work on a public works project, you are entitled to $31.38 for straight time and $41.43 for overtime, per hour. Use a tractor or bobcat and now you are entitled to $41.15 for straight time and $55.13 for overtime, per hour. This is solely because it is a government funded job. Our tax dollars at work.

With the min wage at about $6.75 per hour why should we be taxed more so a ditch digger can make $79K a year when the private sector employee would make $14,040 (ditchdigger working 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year). This is only one way in which our government spends our tax dollars, and it is waste.

We could probably cut all taxes 75% and have a better society (poor are better cared for) if the government quit wasting tax dollars.


BTW, well said Superman. I always enjoy reading your perspectives.

As I said I am not one of the Big winners but who in the hell ever said everyone must win.

There are rewards to hard work. The reward is winning. Why don't we give all those Olympic athletes a gold medal because they all competed. But that would mean the people that where not good enough would be left out. Better give them gold medals too.

We all have the same opportunities. We are all given the chance to attend school from kindergarten through 12th grade. If you take advantage of it you can get into a college for free (work hard good grades you know the drill)

College is what you make of it. Sure an Ivy league will open more doors than the local college but if you do well in either you can apply yourself and work your way up.

Oh and for all those that say we need to give more to the poor, why don't you put you money where your mouth is and DONATE 100% of all income above what is required for you to live to the poor. Don't take a tax right off just give it away. Until you do that you are full of it.

Oh while you are at it. Rent your Porsche out for free to those less fortunate. Everyone deserves the right to feel the thrill of driving a Porsche. Why should you be denied that thrill just because you didn't work hard enough to earn one on your own.

Thanks Paul. I appreciate your posts too. And as long as we're benefitting from each others' views, here are a few factoids on wage laws, particularly prevailing wage laws. They are modeled after the federal Davis-Bacon Act. Davis and Bacon were conservative Southern congressmen. Their Act was proposed to stop folks from eating their lunches. It seems that when large highway contracts came up for bid, out-of-state contractors would underbid their local contractors, and then import cheap labor from other, more depressed, labor markets. Those workers would drain local public assistance and goodwill stores, then take their earnings out of the state. Without a prevailing wage law, California would be an economic "sitting duck."

$79k in earnings would be nice, but that's not the reality. The construction season is perhaps eight months long, not twelve. The construction career (unless you move into management) is perhaps 20 years, certainly not 40. The work is skilled, not unskilled (sure' flagging is fairly easy, but I'd guess that a certification course is required and it is one of the most dangerous of all construction occupations). Finally, while Californica is pretty nice, there are days when I promise you would not trade your job for that of a Seattle Iron Worker erecting red iron on top of an eighty foot structure in freezing rain with a howling wind.

Prevailing wage laws simply mandate that local wage standards be respected on public works. They do not "make up" the wages, they are the local workers' wages. And contractors need this protection, otherwise you'd see nothing but brown faces in those jobs, your unemployment rates would be breathtaking, apprenticeship and other training programs would be a faint memory and you'd get what you pay for.

Super, if you do a search on yahoo under "California prevailing wage attorney" look at the number 1 link. You will notice that you and I have something in common. And yes, I am for the worker. That's the irony in my life - I work all day getting these workers their wages and come here and complain.

Paul, Paul, Paul. I may laugh for the rest of the day. You may also know that I ran the prevailing wage program here in Washington State for a dozen years. And so, I think we can understand each other. I am still a Labor advocate, but just between you and me, well nevermind...others are listening.

I've got a great idea. Let's figure out what everyone needs to live on. Tax everything above that at 100% and redistribute that money to the people who earn below the line. Wouldn't we all be better off for it? I mean, that way we could all have new Trabants instead of Porsches and still have radios with vacuum tubes in them that we'd get to save for 10 years to get. And think how much better bread would taste, if you stood in line for it. Yep, capitalism sucks. Socialism is clearly the better system.

-Paul

I heard about a man who took his wife and kids to his furnace at work, threw his wife in and then jumped in himself. I guess he just wanted the kids to see. The story reminded me of the opinions of some folks here who believe that people make rational choices from unconstrained free will. Many of you will not see the connection I suppose, but I would argue that this man was not making a free, rational choice. But I guess life and death are different from job search decisions. Life and death can come to us as an irrational choice, but employment decisions are always free and rational?

I think we should put poor people in prison, for being so poor.

Until drugs and treatments are affordable to everyone,
and until minimum wage is enough to live on,
we need to keep talking about class-warfare.

From Island: And Paul (pbs, not ettsn who is trying to wind me up ;)) I fundamentally agree with you both - the government doesn't do a good job spending tax money. It needs to be less wasteful.

Your solution is to take the money away - I would rather they just spent it better (besides, you have a huge deficit to deal with). I do not, repeat that - DO NOT - want to see an unbridled welfare state. I just don't think the current tax system in the US is way out of kilter. Spending might be, but tax is not too bad. Like it or not, you guys have pretty bad outcomes for lower socio economic people.

You guys continually focus on the extreme cases - the transients who choose that lifestyle. Those deliberately screwing the system.

The system isn't designed to cover these people - welfare is designed to make sure that those who need it get it. That (inevitably) means that certain people screw the system. Certain corporations perpetrate huge fraud, but I don't believe all corporations are seeking to do so. Similarly, not all beneficiaries are bad.

People have the same rights, but they don't have the same opportunities. There is a suprisingly high percentage of NZ school children who go to school without breakfast (and sometime lunch) at least occasionally, because their parents are either too poor or have mismanaged their funds over the week.

These children don't learn well. They get sick. In these circumstances, while not impossible, it becomes significantly more difficult for someone to lift themselves out of poverty through education.

PS, interestingly, Anna (with the total wisdom of her 24 years) considers you guys to be naive ;)

Here a little clipping that I like from Salon.com:

The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office said one-third of the tax cuts had gone to the richest 1% of Americans, who earn an average of $1.2 million a year.

The average tax cut for them totalled $78,500.

By contrast, those in the middle income bracket got a tax cut of $1,000 and the poorest fifth were doled out the majestic sum of $250 for the whole year. Some tax cut.

The problem for the economy is that rich people don't spend tax cuts as a rule. Poor people do, as any economist could have told Mr Bush, had he been inclined to listen, which is doubtful.

I won't dispute the figures, but the flaw in those numbers is that they leave aside taxes paid.

$250 may not be a majestic sum but if you only paid $500 in taxes, well it's quite a deal to get half of it back.

Perhaps the guy who got $78,500 back paid $157,000 and got half of his back also, but in the end he still paid $78,250 more than the other guy.

My numbers were just random, but you get the point.

Anna is right, many of us are naive. Our federal school lunch program was not created just because we felt sorry for the hungry kids. We noticed that hungry kids don't learn. So, we feed them and it allows them to listen, and learn. similar to your experiences in NZ.

BTW, those of us who are passionate about public policy stuff know that events can occur which are exceedingly frustrating because we cannot believe that someone in public office can be so idiotic, or greedy, or whatever. You can be certain that I was emotionally explosive in my reaction to the suggestion of Mr. Gingrich, et. al.'s suggestion that we PRIVATIZE the school lunch program. I'm not even going to outline why since those of you who trust corporations wouldn't listen and those if you like me do not need to be told what would become of that program. I will point out that my emotional condition was affected by the observation that it was poor kids' food we were talking about. I still shake my head at that one.

I grew up with lunch assistence and food stamps and welfare. It helps, it works, its worth keeping around.

Suck-up. She wasn't so kind to limit her judgement to include only "many" of us as naive.

Sounds like an argument for Methylphenidate (Ritalin).