Taxes News

People Support Taxing The Rich To Fix The Deficit

3:06 pm EST July 6th, 2011 | Economy | 72 Comments

Of course, this means that the Democrats will capitulate completely…

Poll data by the Democratic-aligned Public Policy Polling released Wednesday said voters in Ohio, Missouri, Montana and Minnesota back hiking taxes on the wealthy — even for people with incomes as low as $150,000.

The respondents were asked: “In order to reduce the national debt, would you support or oppose raising taxes on those with incomes over $1,000,000 a year?”

Nearly 80 percent of voters in the four states backed the idea.

Topic: Taxes

Executive Pay Up 23%, They Can Afford A Tax Increase

11:41 am EST July 3rd, 2011 | Business, Economy | 107 Comments

The executives are making money by the bucketload, as the average American’s wages stay the same. Even in downturns, these people are raking it in, but the right says we should engage in “austerity” while the leisure class lives it up. Talk about unsustainable.

The final figures show that the median pay for top executives at 200 big companies last year was $10.8 million. That works out to a 23 percent gain from 2009. The earlier study had put the median pay at a none-too-shabby $9.6 million, up 12 percent.

Total C.E.O. pay hasn’t quite returned to its heady, prerecession levels — but it certainly seems headed there. Despite the soft economy, weak home prices and persistently high unemployment, some top executives are already making more than they were before the economy soured.

They can afford a tax increase. They can live with one less Cessna, one less expensive painting, one less diamond earring, one less big-screen LCD tv, one less Ferrari. They can afford it.

Our democracy can’t afford giving them even more breaks. Not anymore.

Topic: Taxes

Make Them Pay, They Can Afford It

10:33 pm EST July 1st, 2011 | Economy | 62 Comments

As I’ve noted before I fully expect for Senate Dems to cave when the fit hits the shan, but the sentiment here is right.

The resolution offered by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Thursday asks lawmakers to sign off on a “Sense of the Senate” that “any agreement to wealthier taxpayers should reduce the budget deficit should require that those earning $1,000,000 or more per year make a more meaningful contribution to the deficit reduction effort.”

The measure comes as Democrats argue tax breaks for businesses and the wealthy should be eliminated to help close the deficit. Republicans say such tax increases would hurt the economy.

Reid’s bill, S. 1323, is entitled “Sense of the Senate on Shared Sacrifice.”
It makes a series of findings that set up an argument for why wealthier people should pay more taxes to reduce the deficit.

The very rich have it amazingly easy in America. There is nothing wrong about bringing what they pay in taxes back to what it was in the past. We seem to have done quite well during the economic booms of the 1990s and 1940s, the supposed onerous taxes on the Paris Hilton set didn’t seem to inhibit the great economic engine of America from generating wealth.

Conservatives insist that an increase in taxation on the uber-wealthy would be some sort of shackles on the nation. But reality says otherwise.

From a political point of view, the Democrats would be wise to note that there’s already one party in America that nakedly does the bidding of the robber barons, they don’t need to help.

Topic: Taxes

People Don’t Leave States With Higher Taxes On The Rich

12:46 pm EST April 21st, 2011 | Economy | 27 Comments

Dropping some science to disprove a tired conservative trope:

Anti-tax advocates contend that higher taxes on the wealthy lead to millionaire flight. They say this has been seen in Maryland, Rhode Island, New Jersey and New York. The rich are mobile, they say. They can take their money, taxes and jobs wherever they are treated best.

But a new study focusing on New Jersey provides some of the most detailed evidence yet that so-called millionaire taxes have little effect on the movements of millionaires as a whole.

The study, by sociologists Cristobal Young at Stanford and Charles Varner at Princeton, studied the migration patterns of New Jersey’s millionaires before and after 2004, when the state imposed a “millionaire’s tax” that raised rates on those earning $500,000 or more to 8.97% from 6.37%.

(via)

Topic: Taxes

VIDEO: Jon Stewart On The GE Tax Dodge

10:09 am EST March 30th, 2011 | News | 11 Comments

In for a drubbing – Obama, for palling around with GE’s CEO and NBC for ignoring the story.

(via the fully bearded B.D.)

Topic: GE, Taxes

The G.E. Tax Dodge

11:08 am EST March 25th, 2011 | Economy | 116 Comments

It’s simply insane that G.E. is able to duck out on its taxes while across America teachers and cops are forced to pay the price for Wall Street’s casino habit.

General Electric, the nation’s largest corporation, had a very good year in 2010.

The company reported worldwide profits of $14.2 billion, and said $5.1 billion of the total came from its operations in the United States.

Its American tax bill? None. In fact, G.E. claimed a tax benefit of $3.2 billion.

When it comes down to it, this is the fault of conservative economic theory embraced by both parties.

Topic: GE, Tax, Taxes

Paul Ryan Roadmap Would Increase Taxes, Dismantle Medicare & Medicaid

9:50 am EST January 21st, 2011 | Economy, Politics | 82 Comments

paul ryan Of course, when you put it that way, it’s no wonder conservatives would support it:

• The Roadmap would raise taxes on Americans making between $20,000 and $200,000 while slashing taxes in half for the wealthiest Americans. Some three-fourths of Americans would face tax increases.

• The Roadmap would replace corporate taxation with a regressive consumption tax. The corporate income tax would be replaced by an 8.5 percent flat tax. “Not only would corporate taxes fall dramatically, but the profits passed on to owners and shareholders would be tax free, generating significantly more wealth for
the owners of businesses.”

• The Roadmap would place the entire burden of deficit reduction on spending cuts. “The hefty tax hikes on the middle class included in the plan do not go toward deficit reduction. Nor does the Roadmap’s overall revenue plan improve the long-term fiscal outlook. The plan actually reduces federal revenue relative to either current law or current policy.”

• The Roadmap calls for dismantling Medicare and Medicaid, defunding important social programs without addressing the rising cost of health care throughout the economy, and, of course, making our class-based rationing of health care even worse.

• The Roadmap would cut benefits and partially privatize Social Security. The retirement age would be raised, benefits would be cut for most workers now under 55, and the 76-year-old social insurance program “would be gradually replaced with a two-tiered system of privatized accounts for the wealthy and a schedule of reduced benefits unrelated to lifetime earnings for lower-income working Americans.” For a worker who is now 25, that would mean a 24 percent cut in benefits upon retirement, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities

Topic: Medicaid, Medicare, Paul Ryan, Paul Ryan Roadmap, Taxes

New Poll Proves Americans Are Socialist

1:04 pm EST January 3rd, 2011 | Economy | 17 Comments

karl marx Of course, not really. But I’m using the conservative technique of extending one position on an issue to an entire ideology. What is notable is that people do not – repeat – do not, oppose increased taxes on rich people.

Most Americans think the United States should raise taxes for the rich to balance the budget, according to a 60 Minutes/Vanity Fair poll released on Monday.

President Barack Obama last month signed into law a two-year extension of Bush-era tax cuts for millions of Americans, including the wealthiest, in a compromise with Republicans.

Republicans, who this week take control of the House of Representatives, want to extend all Bush-era tax cuts “permanently” for the middle class and wealthier Americans. They are also demanding spending cuts to curb the $1.3 trillion deficit.

Sixty-one percent of Americans polled would rather see taxes for the wealthy increased as a first step to tackling the deficit, the poll showed.
The next most popular way — chosen by 20 percent — was to cut defense spending.

This position is promoted by Fox News and the mainstream press as a fringe, radical point of view, even when it is held by the majority of Americans.

Topic: Socialism, Taxes

Obama Secures Peace For Our Time

7:11 am EST December 7th, 2010 | Democrats, Economy | 127 Comments

obama I see President Obama has returned from his meetings with the GOP leadership and has come back waving and bragging of the agreement that cedes the Sudentenland (background) to the Republican party on taxes.

President Barack Obama announced the parameters of a tentative deal with Republicans on extending the Bush tax cuts, acknowledging that he still strongly opposes the extension of cuts for the very wealthy but saying that continuing a fight at the expense of the middle class would be “the wrong thing to do.”

“We have arrived at a framework for a bipartisan agreement,” the president said, after noting that it is “abundantly clear” that Republicans will block a permanent extension of tax cuts for the middle class without an extension for top earners as well.

“As much as the political wisdom may dictate fighting over solving problems, it would be the wrong thing to do,” to delay resolution until the next year, Obama said.

Well, clearly, now Rush Limbaugh won’t say mean things about Obama anymore. Oh, whoops, that isn’t true. They’ve just conceded to the Republicans without any fight – like they consistently have since almost day one. What they’re telling us now is that their default position is concession and capitulation, giving in to the Republicans on key issues of national importance. He ran on not kicking the can down the road on important issues, but right here – again, with no fight – he’s thrown in the towel.

If President Obama is doing what is within his power to depress his base vote and give the Republican party a new lease on power, well he’s doing a great job at it. If his goal is to be a strong leader and a great Democrat, he’s failing miserably at it. 2010 was a repeat of 1994 and 2002, when all the force of moral good on the side of liberalism can’t overcome a Democratic party that simply will not fight. If he continues on this path, and nothing – absolutely nothing – has shown me otherwise, he’s setting himself up to replicate the Democratic losses of 1980 and 1984 no matter who the Republican nominee is.

We sent him to Washington to stand up and fight. Instead he’s cowering and retreating.

Topic: President Obama, Taxes

Washington Post Covers Up For GOP On Middle Class Taxes

3:13 am EST December 5th, 2010 | Media, Republicans | 83 Comments

washington post building On Saturday, Republicans in the Senate blocked two votes on taxes, particularly one that would have followed the House and cut taxes for the middle class. On Sunday, the Washington Post aided the Republican party by utilizing this headline: “Senate blocks legislation to extend Bush-era tax cuts.”

That headline makes it appear as if the entire Senate, or even a majority of the Senate, made this decision. In fact the vote was 58-36 in favor of proceeding with the legislation, 2 GOP votes shy of what’s needed to move forward. It was not the “Senate” who blocked a tax cut for middle class voters. It was the Senate Republicans who followed in the footsteps of House Republicans in opposing tax cuts for middle class Americans.

For decades now we’ve heard about this liberal media, but it mostly seems concerned about doing Republican’s dirty work for them.

(The writer in question here is one Shailagh Murray, who has carried the water for Senate Republicans before, also see here, here, and here)

Topic: Taxes, U.S. Senate, Washington Post