Back To Sanity On Taxes, Conservatives Revolt For The Rich
Tweet
The Obama budget marks an end to the free ride the Bush era gave to the ultra-rich. Pity the Paris Hiltons.
While President Barack Obama is proposing to cut some taxes for companies that hire workers, his budget would raise a host of other taxes on businesses and wealthy individuals.
The budget proposal released Monday would extend Obama’s signature Making Work Pay tax credit — $400 for individuals, $800 for a couple filing jointly — through 2011. But it would also impose nearly $1 trillion in higher taxes on couples making more than $250,000 and individuals making more than $200,000 by not renewing tax cuts enacted under former President George W. Bush. Obama would extend Bush-era tax cuts for families and individuals making less.
Multi-millionaire Rush Limbaugh jumps right to the front of the line in order to run the bourgeoisie revolution and explain to us that $250,000 isn’t wealthy.
No doubt, they’ll all go Galt like they did last year. Look how it hurt didn’t hurt the GDP.
23 Responses to “Back To Sanity On Taxes, Conservatives Revolt For The Rich”
GOP Rep. Spencer Bachus Facing House Ethics Probe For Insider Trading
Jennifer Aniston Reportedly Pregnant With Twins
PHOTOS: Tamara Ecclestone At The Langham Hotel
Red Front? “Center For American Freedom” Logo Echoes Communist Style
Romney Calls For Defunding Planned Parenthood, Wife Was A Donor
GOP Fundraising Email Asks Supporters To “Knock Out” Obama
Romney Comes Up Limp In Nevada
Obama Opens Lead On Romney In New Poll
Latest Entries
Why Do Liberals Support Drone Strikes?
Weekly Standard Rolls Out The Iraq Argument For Iran
Equal Polarization, My Ass
Some Crazy Stuff That Happened In World War II
Maryland Republican Campaign Funds Used To Defend Voter Suppression
The Obama Jobs Record In One Graph
Martin O’Malley All In For Marriage Equality
Newt Gingrich, Filled With More Excrement Than Your Average Politician
New Year, Powerline Still Stupid
Thanks Again
Meta
Blogroll
Disclaimer
The views on this site are mine and mine alone, and do not reflect the views of my employer, Media Matters for America
© 2000-2011 Oliver Willis
We’re supposed to pretend the country was founded in 1981 and that the top tax rate wasn’t more than twice as much under Ike and 70 percent under Nixon and Ford.
There’s one phrase used to describe those who make more than $250,000: job creators.
The phrase that really comes to mind is ‘consumer of choice’. Who else will by the latest geegaw at first glance?
Job creator just doesn’t fit: I’ve never worked for anyone who made $250K a year. Either it was a small business, a non-profit, or the founder of the company used bank loans to start a small business decades ago that took off. The current CEO of my workplace may well make that much now, but my job was not created as a result of his need, but the requirements of the market and the company. He could earn $25000 a year, and my job would be the same.
Add in the government jobs at the local, state and federal levels who employ a broad swath of people, and we really have stretched that definition thin.
I’m not saying these well off folks are bad people, and they may well hire people. But, they are a small segment of the populace, and are not the sole employer of choice. Their contribution to the economy is not the lynchpin of society they keep claiming it is though.
And these magical job creator light workers can pay their fair share of taxes.
Miley Cyrus, Brett Farve and Jim Carrey create jobs? For who? When? How many?
Their fair share? You of course realize that over 40% of americans dont pay anything at all for income tax, and that the rich (1% of population) already pay over 40% of the income taxes brought in by the government. I think they are already paying more then their fair share. Im not a rich person by any means, but this theory of “redistributing” the wealth to those that “deserve” it is absurd. Just because you work hard to get where you are does not mean you should be taxed differently, and almost stops those looking to better themselves and get promoted because they will get the crap taxed out of them.
In a capitalist society, jobs are made when pooled money is used to build new businesses. Most of the money that fuels silicon valley comes from pension funds and university endowments. Main street jobs are created as often by the SBA and local banks as the income of the wealthy. Lots of ways to create pooled wealth. I don’t see a necessary link between low income taxes and committed capital.
They pay all the taxes because they have all the money, genius! Get me a larger middle class that has more of the wealth and a smaller 1% with a smaller piece of the pie and guess what, the middle class will pay more of the taxes because they have more of the money.
Oh, and the best years for America’s middle class (ya know, the actual mass of the nation) came with tax rates for the rich at 71%. Going back to Clintonian area rates (ya’ know, when we created 20+ million net new jobs) won’t destroy the economy.
The Obama budget marks an end to the free ride the Bush era gave to the ultra-rich.
It also means an end of a tax break that Obama bragged about for the middle-class.
From Obama’s SOTU speech:
Didn’t take him long to make that statement a lie, did it? Or would you just consider it another in a long line of broken promises?
the rich (1% of population) already pay over 40% of the income taxes brought in by the government
Yeah, that’s like, totally unfair. I mean, it’s not like the top 1% get more, you know, income than the rest of us. So why should anyone expect them to pay a bigger share of taxes?
renew the Making Work Pay tax credit for fiscal 2011, but then would have it sunset.
You’re aware, of course, that there are countless provisions of tax law that are fixed one year at a time?
Guaranteed future headline: “Obama administration surprised at lower than expected revenues from taxes on the wealthy.”
Link
They already are, upwards of 60% of their income (when you include state & local taxes).
If the government can’t get by on that, it needs to do less. Period.
Are they all specific campaign promises, like this one happens to be?
it needs to do less. Period.
That makes a nice bumper sticker. But in the real world, you don’t get to just say “Period.” You want tax cuts and no deficit? There’s only one way to accomplish that and your magical budget leprachauns can’t get it done for you.
It won’t be a tax increase until it actually happens. Implementing a one-year fix is NOT an increase in taxes.
Wow. I thought the magical tax fairies only produced more revenue when you cut taxes. Now you’re telling me they also make less revenue when you raise taxes?
It’s maaaaaaagic!
So, in other words, people who have to choose between food and shelter are “Lucky Duckies”?
So the wealthy elites are going to purposefully cripple the country just so they can get more free money from Republicans? And you think this is a good thing?
Also, conservative economics in action.
“…and almost stops those looking to better themselves and get promoted because they will get the crap taxed out of them.”
I like the “almost.” Where is the evidence for this claim? Conservatives say it all the time, but where’s the evidence?
Where is the evidence that someone making $150,000 a year will not try to make $200,000 or more because they’ll get taxed at a higher rate?
Does anyone, anywhere know anyone who refused or would refuse a promotion because the higher pay would put them into a higher tax bracket?
sixty percent of ALL their income? Or sixty percent of the income in the highest bracket?
Just because you work hard to get where you are does not mean you should be taxed differently, and almost stops those looking to better themselves and get promoted because they will get the crap taxed out of them.
Anyone who would reject a promotion on the basis that it will put them into some new, terrible, tax bracket where they will ‘get the crap taxed out of them’ is what we call a “fucking idiot who has 0 understanding of how our tax code operates“.
This is elementary, but many people fail to understand it: Yes, our tax is progressive- however, we have an escalating grade of marginal tax rates. Each only applies to the bottom dollar through to a certain ceiling of income, not your earnings as a whole.
This is an incredibly simplified example (excluding the effects of payroll [which are largely capped and regressive, anyway], state, & local taxes, among others, so take it with a grain of salt), but let’s look at a hypothetical worker (We’ll call him ‘Bill’) using the 2010 marginal rates (which can be found here- although I’ve seen minor variations on these figures around; this could be a smidge off).
Bill files individually and earns $100,000 per year. Therefore, his income peaks at the 28% federal bracket (again, excluding write offs, other taxes, etc), so he pays:
10% on the first $8,375 = $837.50
15% from $8,375 to $34,000 = $3843.75
25% from $34,000 to $68,650 = $8662.50
28% from $68,650 to $100,000 $8778.00
This gives him a total tax liability of $22,121.75.
So, his top marginal rate is 28%, but his effective rate is just about 22% of his non-adjusted income.
He’s offered a promotion which will pay him double what he makes now. Should he turn it down?
No, of course not. He’d be a fucking moron.
Here’s how the leap into the top 35% marginal tax bracket totally rocks his world:
28% from $68,650 to $104,625 = $10073.00
33% from $104,625 to $186,825 = $27126.00
35% from $186,825 to $200,000 = $4611.25
He has $100,000 more in income, and his tax liability is now $55,154- an increase of $33,032.25, to an effective rate of 27.5%.
Obviously, as his income climbs astronomically high, his effective federal income tax rate will approach a pure value of 35% (although on the other end, this will whittle payroll taxes, expressed as a percent of his income, down to nothing), but any way you slice it, a person who passes up a promotion to avoid taxes is essentially paying an enormous tax on being lazy and bad at math.