The Graduated Income Tax

[Chuz Life]

We have always had a progressive income tax and its fair. Like it or not the elites have to pay more, but in reality they can certainty make a hell of a lot less money and pay less. We have multimillionaires and billionaires and how do they make so much money , off the working man. They obviously do not spend it either as they wouldn't be multimillionaires,

so yes they can pay more, and if the lower the top bracket 15% to 25% then the 15% should be to 0. We do not need a tax overhaul.

So much for the idea of "fairness and equality"

 

[Slyhunter]

There is nothing fair about taxing someone who needs 100% or more of his money to survive.

survival in Africa is often about $83/month. So we can then tax an American who makes more than that!

We don't live in Africa.
I'm on team America. We treat Americans better than foreigners. Fight for your team.

 

[BulletProof]

The purpose of the personal income tax is to raise money from the citizenry so that, when added with all the other money raised by the government, the government has sufficient money to do the things that the Constitution says that the Federal government ought to do. It is NOT to “level the playing field,” or to redistribute wealth, or to accomplish any other SOCIAL purpose.

Either you're rich and playing us for fools, or you're dumb as sh1t. (I'm betting dumb as sh1t.) The graduated income tax often fails to tax the rich at as high a percent as the middle-class is taxed, given all the tax breaks the rich can use. And, the fact is, the income tax is used to redistribute wealth, so maybe your dumb@ss should focus more on cutting the poor off of government welfare programs before you worry about ending the graduated tax rate later. Even if the income tax wasn't used redistribute wealth, the reason to tax the rich at a higher rate is because they can bear more. Do you think you can run the US military on the backs of baby factories and the disabled, who themselves don't have any use for the US military?

Being rich does require luck. Hard work alone doesn't life you out of the middle-class. A large percent of the mega-rich were born rich, which, dumb@ss, has nothing to do with hard work. Other mega-rich people had the luck to get into positions that directed money to them -- sure, they put in hard work, but that alone isn't nearly enough.

 

[Penelope]

We have multimillionaires and billionaires and how do they make so much money , off the working man. .

so if billionaires make it off the working man then we should get the billionaires off the working man so the working man can earn what he really should??

Oh those corps are so cheap. Then we have Walmart who work part time people so they do not have to pay bennies. To be a billionaire means one makes money by money laundering, inheritance of a few generations or by buying up companies. Icahn comes to mind. Birds of a feather flock together. The ore money they have , the more tight they become.

 

[Penelope]

We have always had a progressive income tax and its fair. Like it or not the elites have to pay more, but in reality they can certainty make a hell of a lot less money and pay less. We have multimillionaires and billionaires and how do they make so much money , off the working man. They obviously do not spend it either as they wouldn't be multimillionaires,

so yes they can pay more, and if the lower the top bracket 15% to 25% then the 15% should be to 0. We do not need a tax overhaul.

So much for the idea of "fairness and equality"

Its only fair don't you think?

 

[Penelope]

. If we cut their taxes, they'd quit earlier and we'd lose the benefit of their workoholic genius.

totally stupid since they are already rich enough to quit. if we cut taxes though they might have enough to invest in more inventions and jobs. Do you understand?

BS, the rich do not create demand, the middle class does. More money in the middle class and raise the median income that most people are in creates demand.

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

More money in the middle class and raise the median income that most people are in creates demand.

so you want to give them welfare to stimulate the economy?

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

. If we cut their taxes, they'd quit earlier and we'd lose the benefit of their workoholic genius.

totally stupid since they are already rich enough to quit. if we cut taxes though they might have enough to invest in more inventions and jobs. Do you understand?

BS, the rich do not create demand, the middle class does..

wrong of course the rich have much of the wealth and do most of the spending, and they spend it on new businesses that create jobs. 1+1=2

 

[Andylusion]

how do they make so much money , off the working man

Of course they gave the "working man" a job in the first place, but don't let that enter your feeble brain.

Giant Sucklng Sound

Saying that the rich create jobs is like saying that vampires create blood.

Really? Image if there were no rich people. Where would you get a job? The homeless beggar? How would he pay you a wage?

Go on dude... I can't wait to hear your theory of the magic job fairy that supplies jobs. Whatever you come up with, I know it will be very entertaining.

 

[Andylusion]

how do they make so much money , off the working man

Of course they gave the "working man" a job in the first place, but don't let that enter your feeble brain.

Nobody "gives" you anything. Employer makes a profit on every one of those jobs

Um yeah..... that employer does not have to provide a job. In fact, most of the super wealthy, could at any moment, pack up everything, and live on an island with bikini martini girls serving him for the rest of his life... never providing a single job to anyone ever.

Yes, the employer makes money off of the job. He wouldn't create a job, if it didn't benefit him. So what?

Does that change anything? No. You still owe your employer for creating a job.

 

[Andylusion]

There is nothing fair about taxing someone who needs 100% or more of his money to survive. You should only tax discretionary money. Those who can afford a minimum American lifestyle should not be taxed unless they make more than that.

Discretionary money is a subjective claim.

You can live on very little. Know people who lived on less than $10,000 a year. I personally lived on $12,000 a year.

You can make do with very little money.

I would even argue that nearly everyone has "discretionary money". How many poor people, still have money to buy fast food? Nearly all. How many poor people buy lottery tickets? How many poor buy alcohol and cigarettes?

By definition, if you are buying lottery tickets, fast food, smokes and alcohol... then you have discretionary money.

And how many of these poor own a TV, and have cable? How many have internet?

So when you say "tax only discretionary money", to me you are saying "tax everyone".

 

[Andylusion]

We have always had a progressive income tax and its fair. Like it or not the elites have to pay more, but in reality they can certainty make a hell of a lot less money and pay less. We have multimillionaires and billionaires and how do they make so much money , off the working man. They obviously do not spend it either as they wouldn't be multimillionaires,

so yes they can pay more, and if the lower the top bracket 15% to 25% then the 15% should be to 0. We do not need a tax overhaul.

So the kids in school that work really hard and earn good grades, should be required to take more tests and do more homework than the kids who do poorly.

I know people who work two jobs, and put in almost 80 hours a week. They obviously have more, so more should be taken from them.

In what version of reality does this count as 'fair and equal'?

 

[rightwinger]

how do they make so much money , off the working man

Of course they gave the "working man" a job in the first place, but don't let that enter your feeble brain.

Nobody "gives" you anything. Employer makes a profit on every one of those jobs

Um yeah..... that employer does not have to provide a job. In fact, most of the super wealthy, could at any moment, pack up everything, and live on an island with bikini martini girls serving him for the rest of his life... never providing a single job to anyone ever.

Yes, the employer makes money off of the job. He wouldn't create a job, if it didn't benefit him. So what?

Does that change anything? No. You still owe your employer for creating a job.

Oh yes...Ayn Rand
Don't want to upset the wealthy or they will pack up and leave

Employees are "giving" something to employers
Labor from which their wealth is generated

It is the market that creates the job
Employers just fill the need

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

how do they make so much money , off the working man

Of course they gave the "working man" a job in the first place, but don't let that enter your feeble brain.

Nobody "gives" you anything. Employer makes a profit on every one of those jobs

Um yeah..... that employer does not have to provide a job. In fact, most of the super wealthy, could at any moment, pack up everything, and live on an island with bikini martini girls serving him for the rest of his life... never providing a single job to anyone ever.

Yes, the employer makes money off of the job. He wouldn't create a job, if it didn't benefit him. So what?

Does that change anything? No. You still owe your employer for creating a job.

Oh yes...Ayn Rand
Don't want to upset the wealthy or they will pack up and leave

Employees are "giving" something to employers
Labor from which their wealth is generated

It is the market that creates the job
Employers just fill the need

And employers are giving employees something , a paycheck! So??????

What's important is that relationships be peaceful and voluntary and Republican,not shaped at liberal gunpoint. Govt is to assist free peaceful relationships not dictate them a gunpoint. Violence is all a liberal knows!

 

[rightwinger]

how do they make so much money , off the working man

Of course they gave the "working man" a job in the first place, but don't let that enter your feeble brain.

Nobody "gives" you anything. Employer makes a profit on every one of those jobs

Um yeah..... that employer does not have to provide a job. In fact, most of the super wealthy, could at any moment, pack up everything, and live on an island with bikini martini girls serving him for the rest of his life... never providing a single job to anyone ever.

Yes, the employer makes money off of the job. He wouldn't create a job, if it didn't benefit him. So what?

Does that change anything? No. You still owe your employer for creating a job.

Oh yes...Ayn Rand
Don't want to upset the wealthy or they will pack up and leave

Employees are "giving" something to employers
Labor from which their wealth is generated

It is the market that creates the job
Employers just fill the need

And employers are giving employees something , a paycheck! So??????

No they are not giving

They are compensating for labor which created even more profit

 

[Andylusion]

how do they make so much money , off the working man

Of course they gave the "working man" a job in the first place, but don't let that enter your feeble brain.

Nobody "gives" you anything. Employer makes a profit on every one of those jobs

Um yeah..... that employer does not have to provide a job. In fact, most of the super wealthy, could at any moment, pack up everything, and live on an island with bikini martini girls serving him for the rest of his life... never providing a single job to anyone ever.

Yes, the employer makes money off of the job. He wouldn't create a job, if it didn't benefit him. So what?

Does that change anything? No. You still owe your employer for creating a job.

Oh yes...Ayn Rand
Don't want to upset the wealthy or they will pack up and leave

Employees are "giving" something to employers
Labor from which their wealth is generated

You see what is happening in Venezuela when the wealthy pack up and leave? Cuba?

You act like it doesn't happen. It does. Routinely. When France put in place a wealth tax, thousands of wealthy moved out of the country.
Go look up their unemployment rate.

Greece. The list goes on and on.

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

how do they make so much money , off the working man

Of course they gave the "working man" a job in the first place, but don't let that enter your feeble brain.

Nobody "gives" you anything. Employer makes a profit on every one of those jobs

Um yeah..... that employer does not have to provide a job. In fact, most of the super wealthy, could at any moment, pack up everything, and live on an island with bikini martini girls serving him for the rest of his life... never providing a single job to anyone ever.

Yes, the employer makes money off of the job. He wouldn't create a job, if it didn't benefit him. So what?

Does that change anything? No. You still owe your employer for creating a job.

Oh yes...Ayn Rand
Don't want to upset the wealthy or they will pack up and leave

Employees are "giving" something to employers
Labor from which their wealth is generated

It is the market that creates the job
Employers just fill the need

employers must earn more since their contributation is greater and more difficult. This is why there are more employers than employees. Interfere with this natural process as libCommies do and you are on road again to millions of starving people again. Do you know why west Germany did better than east Germany ?

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

Of course they gave the "working man" a job in the first place, but don't let that enter your feeble brain.

Nobody "gives" you anything. Employer makes a profit on every one of those jobs

Um yeah..... that employer does not have to provide a job. In fact, most of the super wealthy, could at any moment, pack up everything, and live on an island with bikini martini girls serving him for the rest of his life... never providing a single job to anyone ever.

Yes, the employer makes money off of the job. He wouldn't create a job, if it didn't benefit him. So what?

Does that change anything? No. You still owe your employer for creating a job.

Oh yes...Ayn Rand
Don't want to upset the wealthy or they will pack up and leave

Employees are "giving" something to employers
Labor from which their wealth is generated

It is the market that creates the job
Employers just fill the need

And employers are giving employees something , a paycheck! So??????

No they are not giving

They are compensating for labor which created even more profit

so what's your point? Everybody knows they give a paycheck in compensation. You think that's profound ? Or a good excuse to put a gun to an owners head and demand more money

 

[Markle]

Saying that the rich create jobs is like saying that vampires create blood.

Presume you are being facetious.

 

[Muhammed]

The purpose of the personal income tax is to raise money from the citizenry so that, when added with all the other money raised by the government, the government has sufficient money to do the things that the Constitution says that the Federal government ought to do. It is NOT to “level the playing field,” or to redistribute wealth, or to accomplish any other SOCIAL purpose.


The “fairest” personal income tax would be a PER CAPITA tax. That is to say, everyone who pays taxes pays the same amount. Just like in a club or an association. The amount would only vary according to the needs of the government, and one’s personal income would not be relevant to the calculation.


But it has been proposed that since people who have greater incomes can easily pay more (though what that has to do with anything, I don’t know), so one might contemplate a PERCENTAGE tax, with everyone paying the same percentage of their taxable income. So that Person Y, who makes twice as much as Person X, pays twice as much in tax as Person X. Well, this is not fair to Person Y, who derives no more benefit from his citizenship than person X…why should be pay twice as much in taxes? No good reason, actually.


Now before we go to the next step, imagine an economy where all of the “income” is pooled into a giant fund. The Central Government takes that pool of money and generates a large number of numbered balls, with one ball for each person in the society. Each ball has an amount written on it, corresponding to an annual income, from $10 thousand through $10 million. The total of the amounts printed on the balls is equal to the total available income in the society. Then each person blindly picks a ball out of the barrel, and his annual income for that year will be the amount printed on the ball – either $10 thousand, ten million, or any number in between, entirely by chance.


IN THAT SCENARIO, it would make perfect sense to have a GRADUATED PERCENTAGE income tax. Because the people who make the most did nothing to earn that exalted income; it came purely by chance, so OF COURSE they cannot complain if a higher percentage of their income is confiscated as personal income tax. In fact, the graduated income tax is entirely fair, in that scenario.


But that is not real life. In real life, most of the people making the top incomes have reached that income level by some combination of HARD WORK, raw talent, superior intelligence, and intelligent risk taking. There are some people who have high incomes due to extreme good fortune, nepotism, or nefarious schemes, successfully executed, but these are a minority and public policy should not be decided on the basis of abnormal situations. And of course there is no rule that requires that the activity or products or services that generate high income must be intrinsically valuable to society; much of what we pay dearly for has minimal intrinsic value…consider a latte at Starbucks. An entertaining video game. A tasty snack. A catchy tune. None of these has any intrinsic value, but they might generate enormous quantities of cash.


The political Left in the country constantly tries, overtly and covertly, to make the case that those with the highest incomes are either lucky or evil, hence astronomical income tax rates FOR THEM is entirely justified by the “needs” of others. But this is bullshit, peddled by a population (Leftists) of whom very few have ever experienced a truly productive or valuable moment in their pathetic little lives. It is not coincidence that the cars in the corporate parking lot at 8pm are high-end cars; for the most part, the people who can afford them are the very same people who work 50, 60, and more hours a week. It is not “luck" that enables them to buy those high-end cars.


Therefore, I submit to you that the graduated income tax is the least fair personal tax system imaginable. It punishes success in the same way as if high incomes were just randomly distributed among the population, through no merit at all on the part of the high earner. And the people who are advocating for marginal tax rates of 70-90% (not that they even understand what a “marginal tax rate” is) are evil, and don’t deserve serious consideration.

And don't forget, there is a word for any politician who tells you that he is being "compassionate." It starts with "T" and ends with "hief."

People who make more money benefit from our society more, and therefore they should pay more to keep it.

What I do not like is being forced to pay more money that will simply be wasted. I would happily pay more income taxes in order to benefit society as a whole if I knew that it was not being squandered.