Forum Post: I'd like information.
Posted 13 years ago on Nov. 9, 2011, 11:55 p.m. EST by naomai
(1)
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Okay, you want to stop the greed of the top 1%. Then what? Distribute the money, give it to the government, raise their taxes?
Naomai, I don't have time tonight, but I would be happy to explain how taxation can help to create better conditions for decreasing market volatility, while promoting job creation, infrastructure improvements and the creation of new commercial enterprises, by, for instance, lowering the cost of capital, for potential entrepreneurs and Corporations. How tax increases will help contribute to lowering the costs of doing business, in the USA. How tax increases will help companies maximize profitability, off of servicing the US economy and how taxes may contribute to the one thing that is essential to sustaining the benefits of free cash flow and maximizing long term growth in shareholder value, population growth; but it is 12:08 AM and I too tired to do it now. If I forget to get back to you, please IM me sometime and I will explain away! S! MJ
Why thank you, I'll be sure to do that.
all you need to do is to look at the tax structure of the united states in the 1960's when life was much better for working and middle class families. our economy was in better shape also. in most of europe tax money is used to make life easier for the bulk of the population. they still have the problems we have with tax money going to feed the big corporations etc but they do a better job of supporting working people. health care is free (mostly) - college is free (mostly!) - more vacation time and better retirements. our taxes go to the military - 54 cents of each tax dollar goes to the military in one way or the other - and do you benefit from that - i don' think so
In the interim, here's something I wrote up on why people need to stop fearing progressive tax structures even if the top brackets are fairly high:
At this point the tax codes do need reforming, but "reforming the tax code" and "cutting taxes" are not the same thing. What we have right now is essentially a maze of Swiss cheese comprised of differing federal, state and local taxes. I choose that analogy because the ordinary guy who plays by the rules and pays his taxes when they come due no matter how onerous gets lost in the maze and finds his bank account half empty by the time it's over with because of burgeoning property taxes, obscure little rules, etc. while the millionaire or large corporation has the option of hiring a lawyer (or posse thereof), finding every single hole in the tax code, and proceeding to drive a Humvee through it.
What does this have to do with you? If you hear the words "progressive taxation" and immediately think "Shit. There goes my savings..." then it has everything to do with you. When most people think of taxes they think of property taxes, gas taxes, sales taxes, etc. that never seem to go down or go away and look like a really nasty way of nickel-and-diming you out of your hard-earned money. And, in fact, they probably are: consumption and property taxes tend to be among the most regressive forms of taxation and you are right to want relief.
Here's how tightening the tax code and even modestly raising federal income taxes on a national level may help you out: the types of taxes that I outlined above are generally administered on a state and/or local level to directly subsidize hospitals/schools/roads/etc. in your neighborhood. Nobody likes them, but they're a necessary means of balancing state and local budgets when federal grants can't keep pace with community reinvestment. Put simply, if administering and maintaining a top--flight high school costs $80 million per year and your district only gets $50 million from the federal and state governments, that extra $30 million has to come from somewhere.
If the wealthiest Americans and corporations paid out the actual nominal tax rates upfront to both the feds and the state governments (for those states with income and corporate taxes), then it might well be possible for everyone from the working class guy to the upper-middle class guy to have their cake and eat it too. More money in the federal coffers equals more money that the feds can give to state and local governments for things like schools and roads, and thus less money these governments have to raise on their own. This then means that many of the most onerous state and local taxes (including the hated property taxes) would stop going up and in certain cases might even go down without any reduction in services provided.
What people need to know is that real tax reform won't hurt them a bit if they've been playing by the spirit of the law and not the letter; closing loopholes and "redistribution of ill-gotten gains" or however else they're going to see it posted here is simply a catchier way of saying that we want to put the letter of the law back in line with the spirit in which it was enacted. Now, if you've gotten accustomed to working the loopholes and looking to pay as close to no taxes as possible, then that should be a scary prospect. If, on the other hand, you've been doing things the right way all along you should welcome us; if everyone else starts paying their fair share the way you already do, that actually translates to less civic and financial responsibility for you.
You really, really. don't get it. Paying taxes is UnAmerican. And no one in upper working class America, or even lower middle class America, should ever have to pay more than 10 to 15% of their income in taxes. But in many places of the country they are currently averaging over 45%. And everybody wants more... it's just not going to happen. And honestly, I see no reason whatsoever why any corporation should have to pay YOUR school taxes. What they should be paying is an equivalent income tax. By the way, I'm not rich and I do not own a corporation; I just don't believe in passing the buck for your own failure to live within your means.
Paying taxes is un-American? Seriously? Getting gouged on your taxes is a problem, but even you have to admit that making the wealthy pay their fair share is perfectly acceptable. In fact, you did, by laying out that the working and lower middle classes should be taxed at an effective rate of 10-15% if that. Here's the thing: that's about where their income taxes for that income group are, and I have NO plans to raise them. I also don't know where you got that 45% number; the current rate on the top brackets is 35% (and that's before deductions; after deductions we're talking more like 15%).
Corporate tax is currently organized into a set of brackets much like income brackets, and once again you're looking at a 35% nominal top-out and more like 10-15% if that by the time they're finished deducting everything. Adding a couple of new brackets at the top and phasing out deductions for businesses over a certain size so that they actually pay close to the nominal rate of federal corporate tax is simply good policy and good for our revenues.
As far as school taxes go, I'm not proposing additional school taxes or anything of the sort; my point is that federal corporate taxes and federal income taxes play a major role in paying for services that everyone needs. When everyone pays their fair share, then the need for penny-pinching regressive taxes like property taxes, sales taxes, etc. goes way down. As far as the idea that nobody should be paying for anyone else's schools, just remember that if they cop out now don't come crying to me when they start pulling all but their lowest-level employees from overseas because so few Americans have the educational background to take those jobs.
I'll tell you where I got the 45%. I pay at least 20 thousand a year in federal and state taxes. Additionally I pay over 10 a year in property taxes, county taxes, town taxes, school taxes. I pay almost 9% on all consumer items. I pay 7% on all gasoline purchases. I pay taxes on fuel oil and taxes and fees on all utility bills. I pay taxes on EVERYTHING including use of the Internet now.
And I'm not 1%; here, I'm not even considered middle class. Many pay far more than I do.
You can't keep taxing people into poverty and claim progress. It is absolutely Un-American because taxes are slavery - they own a portion of our labor. Even Presidents generally try to skate on their taxes because they view it in the same light. And then you think you're going to tax the rich? Good luck with that.
I'm not going to deny that you're apparently getting the shit gouged out of you. However, what's going on here is not that taxation is inherently onerous or evil; what's going on is that you're essentially paying taxes on behalf of corporations and the wealthy. What they fail to pay in corporate taxes and income taxes comes out of your paycheck in property taxes, school taxes, gas taxes, utility taxes, etc.
If you tax the people and corporations that can actually afford it and then start actually siccing the IRS on the ones that don't pay up then it should get easier to bring down taxes at the state and local level. In effect, what I'm proposing would bring down your taxes when everything is said and done because higher federal taxes on corporations and more efficient allocation of federal money means more money available to support your state, town, county, etc. and the less they need to take from you directly.
I have news for ya: taxes never go down. In fact, due to obamacare and the tremendous expected increase to the Medicaid roles, for which the state of NY is 50% responsible, all counties in the state are now seeking huge increases. That definitely effects the working and middle classes.
Correction: Taxes never go down on their own. That said, when conditions are right it is definitely possible to push for lower taxes (or at least a moratorium on increases) at the state and municipal level, which is apparently where the majority of your burden's coming from. Of course, all of this depends on the efficiency with which federal, state, and local governments can disburse tax dollars, and I do believe that efficiency can be improved. However, if you make corporations and the wealthy pay their fair share then you at least have a shot at reducing or stabilizing your own tax burden.
Not at the rate obama's spending you don't.
I wouldn't say that the rate at which Obama's spending is the problem; it's the efficiency with which the money is spent. The size of the government and the efficiency with which it spends tax dollars are two very different things, and in fact a lot of the inefficiencies in our government right now have to do with attempts to privatize things that by rights should be publicly handled.
If we start taking a look at our defense budget for real we'll probably find all sorts of contracts that are late and over budget, or simply more expensive than training and maintaining your own people. If you look at the Lockheed Martin fighter jet flap it probably would have been cheaper to train a team of engineers and build the prototyping equipment they'd need. If we take government-subsidized private firms and consolidating those operations in-house, we have a start right there; if we stop giving crazy tax breaks for companies doing R&D and moved those operations back in-house the cost of funding the labs and paying the people would probably be less than the lost revenue. The same goes for mercenary firms like Blackwater; we already have trained, disciplined soldiers capable of providing security; why should we pay a private firm to provide less qualified people at a net loss to the taxpayer?
Slow down and actually take a look at whether or not we actually need to be handing out 90% of farm subsidies; ten to one we're subsidizing agribusiness conglomerates who really don't need it. Rather than directly paying subsidies we should encourage the breakup of large corporations like Monsanto (and a consequent revision of IP and patent law to put an end to the seed patenting game) and buy up surpluses from small farmers to store in a national food bank for use in natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina. As a rule, paying a private company to provide a service is more expensive than providing it oneself. The same goes to private insurance companies; what you have right now is runaway inflation of health insurance costs because nobody's challenging companies for jacking up the market. I do believe that a public option would be able to provide satisfactory care levels at affordable rates and still turn a tidy profit for the taxpayers.
Finally, if we want to avoid further asset bubbles of the sort that caused the 2008 collapse we need to restore Glass-Steagall and really begin regulating Wall Street. Part of that regulation will be enforcing real penalties for violations, including fines of hundreds of millions of dollars. Those fines will provide the government yet another source of income beside our taxes, and thus mean that the government will be able to do more with less of our money. In sum, a strong government does not have to be bloated and inefficient, and if we give Uncle Sam a less anemic revenue stream and allow him to do certain things for himself instead of relying on corporate contracts you'd be surprised at the results you get.
The 2008 collapse was of absolute necessity. Lending practices had to be reined in and housing prices had to be readjusted to make them more affordable.
I'm with you on everything but defense - the defense industries provide a tremendous employment in thousands of different classifications and they continually push the envelope of our technology which, more often than not, leads to the creation of new industry. .
It's not about stopping greed. It's about stopping corruption.
and greed
I'm not sure greed can be eliminated. Laws can stop corruption, or at least hinder it. Greed is a human condition. That probably takes evolution. I'm not saying all humans are greedy, of course, many are not.
you are right, we can only stop greed by process of setting the example. it's worth a try, even if we don't see a result in our lifetimes...
what kind of weird propagandistic pap is this? "we have to set the example", "it's worth a try" (like we aren't doing that already, like we are being greedy now?!) Like we have to sacrifice even more, it's up to us, our oppression is noble and if we bitch about it, it's because we're not noble enough, it's all our responsibility, all our fault? whether you are bullshitting or unintentionally repeating bullshit, it is bullshit. Designed to put the burden and blame on we who've kept having it heaped on us. I'm not saying we shouldn't be nice, or that everyone, regardless of wealth or poverty, shouldn't be an example of "sharing". But I sense a distorted motive in your words. If you're a troll, work on subtlety. All other trolls will be honing their doublespeak skills, I'm sure.
You sense a distorted motive? To want to set an example for our children to have Compassion towards their fellow man? I didn't say anything about blame or fault which leads me to believe that you are framing my statement as a basis for your own agenda.
Eventually you will get very old and someone will have to feed you and wipe your ass. God help you with that attitude.
I don't have an agenda. My hunch is I am more aware of the need for compassion in society than you are. Most folks already do set a compassionate example, most folks are already sacrificing plenty, most folks can't afford to be greedy, so they don't need to be told "it's worth a try" to "start" modeling anti-greed like we're not doing that already, or that "it's the only way to stop greed" like WE are where the greed is.
this isn't a pissing contest. we weren't occupying two months ago, and if those very few people didn't "give it a try" in the first place we wouldn't be here now. how on earth would you know what i have done in my life to help other people? your accusations are very strong and reveal more about your issues than mine.
Very true. I'm poor but I've given a little to worthy causes. I like money but I'm not greedy. That's not a contradiction. My siblings and I were taught to share.
It's not solely about money. we are setting a model for sharing each others' talents, ideas, compassion and resources not necessarily in the form of cash but, for example, services... we are showing that with human will and hard work we can carry each other through difficult times.
I like how you think. It's too soon to tell for sure, but it appears people all over the world are beginning to open their eyes to the grim realities of our modern times. It could very well be the beginning of a new age of enlightenment. If we don't get crushed first. It's a big club of very evil individuals working against us.
First of all you can't stop greed but you can tax it. That's what we did back in the Great Depression to reverse the extreme inequality of incomes which almost took down capitalism. When all the money goes to the top eventually you have too few consumers to buy enough products to keep our economy running. This is the purpose of upper income taxation, in effect it recycles the money (redistributes) it to the lower class so that the economy keeps going.
When the banks stop over charging, people can hold on to more of their money. They can start business, make purchases in their communities. Catch up on bills. It will start a chain reaction. When the government stops bailing out companies with tax payer money, that money can go back into schools, into senior centers. when the greedy corporations stop hoarding the money for the CEO's, then people can get their jobs back.
Not all taxes are created equal, and many people that want to raise taxes for the rich have no idea what those taxes do to the economy. The income tax we are used to taxed mostly labor and capital, when we should be taxing the rent seekers.
The theory of economic rent has been around for some time, but land taxation has seldom been implemented throughout history. It is well known that the factors of production are composed of land, labor and capital. Land, in the economic sense, can be explained as anything with a productive capacity that has not been created by men or women, but has value created by the community. Labor is any human energy spent , whether by the mind or through brute force, that contributes to a means of production. Capital is mainly what is spent from savings for future production. Under the current system, mainly labor and capital are taxed, while the landed elite make out like bandits with the rents that are created by the community! It is no surprise that civilizations have suffered from vast inequalities since the founding of the first governments.
What we need to fight for is a redistribution of these economic rents for the sake of the people, while at the same time reducing the tax rates on labor and capital. These rents from land are the source of all wealth and are presently held by a small number of wealthy people who will speculate and slow there productive capacity in order to increase profits.
This demand goes out to the people of OWS! If there is one thing we need to change in order to promote equality, environmental protection and job creation through increased productive capacity, this is the solution we need. Please read about economic rent and land taxation in order to fully grasp the concept.
A simple way to look at this is to look at it as though you are being robbed on a "class" level...when fuel ...food...housing...education...healthcare become luxuries for the middle class and profits for the companies that supply these goods and services have record breaking increases...such as the...Oil and gas industry...the mortgage/lending/banking industry...medical...pharmaceutical and medical insurance industry...industries that supply weapons and "rebuild" countries we leave our footprint on...the only way those companies can afford record breaking incomes for their "executives" and their stockholders is by gouging the American poor and middle class...because we need these things to survive...they don't...rich don't care about buying food...gas...housing...healthcare...education and of coarse they could never make the profits on their own usage...they need the masses to churn and overpay to obtain their record breaking profits...when I was young...it used to be called "fair market value"...you know when the masses bought things the price would come down..not every little thing was supposed to make "everyone" wealthy...now the term thats used most often is "what ever the market will bare"...juice up the price on things we need and can't live with out until a good percentage can't afford the necessary things in life...and to boot to increase their profits companies have taken our industries overseas for cheap labor...can you imagine people in this country living on $100 a week to compete with having things made overseas...if we made things here in america things would be more expensive to make...but people would be able to buy them because they earned more and lets not even talk about the quality would be better...so...take away our jobs...charge prices we can't afford...kill our school systems...increase our medical costs because people can't afford preventive care...force our economy in to a credit based never catch up in debt...ohhhh you get the picture I'm sure.
What you fail to grasp is that when an industry - say banking - institutes new fees, fees they do not charge at smaller institutions simply because the bank is profitable without the necessity of gouging their neighbors, when an industry behaves like this they siphon cash out of the pocket of the middle class.
Which, of course, is the purpose of large corporations - to exploit resources, human, economic, and natural. That is their function.
Unfortunately what happens is that there is less cash left over to spend on food, or on home improvements, or whatever, and the economy as a whole contracts. Everyone suffers, only the lower classes are the ones who perceive that suffering.
What goes around, comes around . . .
Old hippie fuck I need your help. Need help making a t-shirt. We need to draw a picture of Zooccotti Park with a cage around it. Here are some ideas: Draw a hippie climbing the cage like a monkey and throwing shit. Draw a hippie rolling in mud and shit like a pig. Draw a hippies fucking like dogs. Draw a picture of a hippie eating peanuts like a big fucking elephant. Draw a hippie as a lazy fucking Ape doing nothing.
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actually, the 1% could actually just take their share. the argument is how much value an exec ads to the company. This is a false argument. Most execs actually just manage the value created by demand. They also are not the producers. They could not by themselves fill any order of any corporation. most of the earned value of a company belongs to those who provide the company with the possibility for production in the first place. they are the ones providing a supply to the demand. an exec is a glorified middleman and should be paid accordingly. this alone would make capitalism work as it should. money must circulate for capitalism to work. right now it's bottle-necked.
Occupy wallet.