Yes, I know they're taxed differently.
The question I asked was "HOW MUCH DO THEY PAY IN TAX?" and your answer was "here's some article about one type of tax" and my response was "that doesn't tell me ANYTHING".
It's that simple.
You think Buffett is doing all this for you? He's not. There's a reason we don't know how much these people pay, and it's because they don't want us to know how little they're paying.
Actually I think because it's none of our business. No matter what they pay, it's still a hell of a lot more than what your average American pays.
No, Buffett isn't doing anything for me, it just happens to work out that way. The reason we have lower capital gains taxes IS to encourage investments that do benefit all of us.
And that's the other thing that bothers me so much about these topics. The wealthy do benefit our society greatly. They create jobs, new taxation, products, services, and all the left can think of doing is cutting them down. The people they defend are the leaches of our society that contribute little or nothing, create problems for society, and people we can generally do without if you ask me.
I'm sorry, but I just don't understand that mindset.
I'd say it would be none of our business if what they were paying were FAIR.
The problem is some of them have managed to buy Congress, buy politicians and when it becomes that corrupt, it is the business of the people.
One thing is to encourage investment. Another is to encourage rich people to give lots of money to politicians to do the bidding of the rich. Taxing the rich at a lower rate might encourage investment, but taxing the poorer people at a lower rate can encourage spending, as can taxing the Middle Class at a lower rate. You can make such arguments all day, but that doesn't stop things being unfair.
I'm not talking here about taxing the wealthy to death. I'm talking about making them pay a fair amount which people can trust in. The problem is you have the Koch brothers trying to take over the country. That doesn't benefit you. The partisan politics that they're defending because it's in their interests is killing the country.
There is a problem also with the leaches of society. But the rich don't care. They like having these people in order to create an environment where they can manipulate people all the time.