According to the CBO...

[hjmick]

CBO: The rich pay an outsized share of taxes - Washington Times

Wealthy Americans earn about 50 percent of all income but pay nearly 70 percent of the federal tax burden, according to the latest analysis Tuesday by the Congressional Budget Office — though the agency said the very richest have seen their share of taxes fall the past few years.

CBO looked at 2007 through 2009 — the latest years data are available, but enough to include the early effects of the last recession — and found the bottom 20 percent of American earners paid just three-tenths of a percent of the total federal tax burden, while the richest 20 percent paid 67.9 percent of taxes.

The top 1 percent, whom President Obama has made a target during the presidential campaign, earned 13.4 percent of all pre-tax income but paid 22.3 percent of taxes in 2009, CBO said. When tax burden is figured in, the top 1 percent took in only 11.5 percent of income...

So let's punish them some more...




Let the bashing begin...

 

[uscitizen]

This is due to our current tax system.

We need a pure flat tax with no deductions.

you make 1,000 you pay 10%
you make 1,000,000 you pay 10%

or whatever the flat rate works out to be.

 

[Ravi]

Maybe it's because the earning power of the middle and lower groups has declined or disappeared due to the recession.

 

[Widdekind]

inexpertly, the OP discusses only half the story, taxes paid. High-income earners pay more taxes. But, meanwhile, low-income earners receive more tax-transfers, i.e. welfare. The US tax code is a "Robin Hood" system, that takes taxes from high-income earners; and gives welfare to low-income earners. Overlooking the 2008 recession, total net taxes, for the entire US public, have hovered around zero since the 1970s. Oversimplifying, all the taxes paid by people, are re-routed, and given back to other people. So, if high-income earners are paying more; then low-income earners are receiving more (so that, summed over everybody, the net losses cancel out the net gains)

 

[daveman]

Face it, lefties -- you just don't have any idea what you're saying when you want to take money from the rich to pay for your leftist Utopia.

Eat the Rich

This year, Congress will spend $3.7 trillion dollars. That turns out to be about $10 billion per day. Can we prey upon the rich to cough up the money? According to IRS statistics, roughly 2 percent of U.S. households have an income of $250,000 and above. By the way, $250,000 per year hardly qualifies one as being rich. It's not even yacht and Learjet money. All told, households earning $250,000 and above account for 25 percent, or $1.97 trillion, of the nearly $8 trillion of total household income. If Congress imposed a 100 percent tax, taking all earnings above $250,000 per year, it would yield the princely sum of $1.4 trillion. That would keep the government running for 141 days, but there's a problem because there are 224 more days left in the year.

How about corporate profits to fill the gap? Fortune 500 companies earn nearly $400 billion in profits. Since leftists think profits are little less than theft and greed, Congress might confiscate these ill-gotten gains so that they can be returned to their rightful owners. Taking corporate profits would keep the government running for another 40 days, but that along with confiscating all income above $250,000 would only get us to the end of June. Congress must search elsewhere.

According to Forbes 400, America has 400 billionaires with a combined net worth of $1.3 trillion. Congress could confiscate their stocks and bonds, and force them to sell their businesses, yachts, airplanes, mansions and jewelry. The problem is that after fleecing the rich of their income and net worth, and the Fortune 500 corporations of their profits, it would only get us to mid-August. The fact of the matter is there are not enough rich people to come anywhere close to satisfying Congress' voracious spending appetite. They're going to have to go after the non-rich.​

Anyone who screeches "Make the rich pay their fair share!" may as well be saying, "I'm an idiot easily swayed by the rhetoric of envy!"

 

[Wiseacre]

This is due to our current tax system.

We need a pure flat tax with no deductions.

you make 1,000 you pay 10%
you make 1,000,000 you pay 10%

or whatever the flat rate works out to be.

Could not agree more. I would however make the income under the poverty rate exempt.

 

[Trajan]

This is due to our current tax system.

We need a pure flat tax with no deductions.

you make 1,000 you pay 10%
you make 1,000,000 you pay 10%

or whatever the flat rate works out to be.

no not quite;

under 100k 12% over 100k to 500k 18%, over that, 23%.

 

[Widdekind]

why tax incomes at all? A tax is a penalty -- why penalize hard work & earning money ? A general sales tax of 10% could generate $3T / year in revenue (10% of official "Gross Output"); would bother no person or business with the hassle of doing taxes; and would only penalize spending, not working, earning, & saving. A flat-rate 10% sales tax could fund government at current levels; simplify everybody's lives; and represent a pro-work, pro-earning, pro-saving, anti-spending "societal outlook".

 

[Rshermr]

You are simplifying a very complex subject. Study the concept of progressive taxes, and see if you agree or not.
for instance, when we had a high marginal upper tax rates, companies tended to reinvest taxable income back into the company to decrease taxes they were paying. One of the reasons the 50s and 60s had such high income growth. Today, you get mergers and acquisitions, buying back corporate stock, etc. all of which have less impact on productivity, more impact on stockholder wealth.

 

[Widdekind]

You are simplifying a very complex subject...

exactly

for the US, a 10% flat-rate tax, on final goods & services (GDP, cars & haircuts); and on intermediate goods & services (raw materials, parts & labor); would generate nearly $4T / year

simple & effective (tautology)

 

[daveman]

Face it, lefties -- you just don't have any idea what you're saying when you want to take money from the rich to pay for your leftist Utopia.

Eat the Rich

This year, Congress will spend $3.7 trillion dollars. That turns out to be about $10 billion per day. Can we prey upon the rich to cough up the money? According to IRS statistics, roughly 2 percent of U.S. households have an income of $250,000 and above. By the way, $250,000 per year hardly qualifies one as being rich. It's not even yacht and Learjet money. All told, households earning $250,000 and above account for 25 percent, or $1.97 trillion, of the nearly $8 trillion of total household income. If Congress imposed a 100 percent tax, taking all earnings above $250,000 per year, it would yield the princely sum of $1.4 trillion. That would keep the government running for 141 days, but there's a problem because there are 224 more days left in the year.

How about corporate profits to fill the gap? Fortune 500 companies earn nearly $400 billion in profits. Since leftists think profits are little less than theft and greed, Congress might confiscate these ill-gotten gains so that they can be returned to their rightful owners. Taking corporate profits would keep the government running for another 40 days, but that along with confiscating all income above $250,000 would only get us to the end of June. Congress must search elsewhere.

According to Forbes 400, America has 400 billionaires with a combined net worth of $1.3 trillion. Congress could confiscate their stocks and bonds, and force them to sell their businesses, yachts, airplanes, mansions and jewelry. The problem is that after fleecing the rich of their income and net worth, and the Fortune 500 corporations of their profits, it would only get us to mid-August. The fact of the matter is there are not enough rich people to come anywhere close to satisfying Congress' voracious spending appetite. They're going to have to go after the non-rich.​

Anyone who screeches "Make the rich pay their fair share!" may as well be saying, "I'm an idiot easily swayed by the rhetoric of envy!"

Once again, leftists pretend a post with inconvenient truth in it doesn't exist.

 

[Si modo]

This is due to our current tax system.

We need a pure flat tax with no deductions.

you make 1,000 you pay 10%
you make 1,000,000 you pay 10%

or whatever the flat rate works out to be.

Wow! I had no idea you were into such fairness.

 

[Ravi]

Maybe it's because the earning power of the middle and lower groups has declined or disappeared due to the recession.

Once again, cons ignore the inconvenient truth.

 

[hjmick]

Maybe it's because the earning power of the middle and lower groups has declined or disappeared due to the recession.

Once again, cons ignore the inconvenient truth.

No, I think they're just ignoring you.

 

[Ravi]

Maybe it's because the earning power of the middle and lower groups has declined or disappeared due to the recession.

Once again, cons ignore the inconvenient truth.

No, I think they're just ignoring you.

Well, they shouldn't. I am, after all, shouldering more than my share of the tax burden.

 

[daveman]

Maybe it's because the earning power of the middle and lower groups has declined or disappeared due to the recession.

Once again, cons ignore the inconvenient truth.

Ahem.

 

[expat_panama]

Maybe it's because the earning power of the middle and lower groups has declined or disappeared due to the recession.

Once again, cons ignore the inconvenient truth.

Ahem.

--likewise...

 

[daveman]

Once again, cons ignore the inconvenient truth.

Ahem.

--likewise...

And reality once again curb-stomps leftist memes.

 

[Widdekind]

In real terms (inflation-adjusted 2010 dollars), average US household incomes (mean of middle quintile) have stagnated since 2000 -- at about $50K / year per household, the highest in history. Official "HI" excludes pension contributions, welfare transfers, and capital gains. Today, average US household welfare receipts are $10K / year per household. Even excluding welfare (and other forms of income), US households are keeping pace with the economy, earning (on average) solidly middle-class incomes, of $50K / year, in real terms. And that is despite 2001 and 2008, from which the US economy has yet to recover. What do people want? (to complain?) Average HI has stalled, at the highest levels ever, due to major recessions. Downturns always depress incomes, the same as always, like 1991, and 1980. Get the economy running again, and HI will grow again. HI was growing on trend, until 2008. 2008 is (still) the problem, not business profits, nor personal incomes.

 

[signelect]

One thing is for certain Obama doesn't have a clue. You see he has never had a job, paid expense or hired people. He has lived of the tax dollars of others his entire life. We need a businessman in office and yes I have read about Bain Capital..