To the democrats in YA..how much of the tax burden on the rich will make you happy?

Question

Every Democrat running for President wants to raise taxes on "the rich," but they will have to do something miraculous to outtax President Bush. Based on the latest available tax data, no Administration in modern history has done more to pry tax revenue from the wealthy.

Last week the Congressional Budget Office joined the IRS in releasing tax numbers for 2005, and part of the news is that the richest 1% paid about 39% of all income taxes that year. The richest 5% paid a tad less than 60%, and the richest 10% paid 70%.

Does this seem fair to you??..or should those evil rich folks pay even more??...
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119786208643933077.html?mod=opinion_main_review_and_outlooks

Freshmeatpuppet:....ooookkk..so YOU won't be happy until all their wealth is gone and they are just like you??....how much is too much??..where should we limit them??....THAT is why socialism is so dangerous!!...it brings EVERYONE down to a low level instead of allowing EVERYONE to rise up and be whoever they want to be...if YOU aren't making enough money do something about it...educate yourself...seek advanced training...work harder...the capitalist system does not limit you or ANYONE ....socialism is shared misery...capitalist allows and encourages anyone to go as high as they limit themselves!!!!....

neenie: why the personal attack?? I give you facts and you do your best to insult me...I'm not rich...but I don't go around envying the rich either...yes I do whine about the SS being taken out of my check especially since the dems have added SS to the general funds and is spending it on their pet projects to get themselves elected and SS is and has been going broke!!!..another example of socialism that failed. When you have something other then insults to say get back to me...do a little research first ok?

GW....great quote...hope you don't mind if I use that.
A Government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul"

Man...I can see the envy and jeolousy just dripping from the libs here...like Chinagirl says...ever get hired by a poor person....rich doesn't mean evil people!!!....I know that is the dem montra, probably from the "rich" dems in congress....if you're not making enough then DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!!....its all about punishing the "rich" because you're NOT rich....sad.

freshmeat:...they ARE sharing the bigger burden....is that not enough??...why don't we just take it all???.........if Gates and Buffett want to give more to ease their guilt, I'm sure the feds will be all too pleased to take it....

Moody Red: PERFECT EXAMPLE!!!.

Tompin: So, everyone who owns property is rich now???....you own NOTHING in this great country??..car??..great sterio??..NOTHING???....do you make a living in this great country???....if those evil ones who do own property were attacked by outside forces that wouldn't effect you??>......good grief

who else: one one hand you say Im "imagining" the dems are plotting to raise my taxes, but then you say the dem tells me to my face that they will raise them....sounds like I'm not imagining thing after all huh?..the dems say they will only raise taxes on the "rich"..somehow, this high school educated machinist always is classified as "rich" when the taxes are raised..but when they say they are going to cut taxes on the ones making less, mine never gets cut...No people, Im far from rich...but I'm right where I want to be...if I wanted more money I wouldn't look to government to give it to me, I'd do something MYSELF to better my position..I don't look at others who make more then me with envy...many I admire...many I pity...but I don't think anyone should be penalized for making more money then me....that is greed..that is envy

hottiecj: You nailed what I have been trying to get across with this answer....THANK YOU!!

correction...Question...lol

Answer 1

Sort of sounds like one of my friends told me. 10 guys go out to dinner everyday at the same restaurant and the bill is $100. They split the bill according to the way they pay their taxes:

The first 4 (the poorest) pay nothing
the fifth pays $1
the sixth pays $3
the seventh pays $7
the eighth pays $12
the ninth pays $18
the tenth (the richest) pays $59

These guys ate together everyday and were quite happy with the arrangement.
The owner of the restaurant comes by one day and says, "you are such great customers, I am lowering the price of your meal to $80

They broke the bill down to be fair:
The first four were unaffected
But now the fifth man paid nothing (100%savings)
the sixth man paid $2 instead of $3 (33% savings)
the seventh paid $5 instead of $7 (28% savings)
the eighth paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings)
the ninth paid $14 instead of $18 (22% savings)
the tenth $49 instead of $59 (16% savings)

I only got a dollar off said the sixth man, and he, the tenth man, got $10 off, that's not fair!

The fifth man declared the same thing!
The seventh man said ,"yeah, why should he get $10 when I only get two?"
The first four men proclaimed in unison, "Hey we didn't get anything at all."

The next night the tenth man didn't show up for dinner at all, leaving the rest to pay. And they didn't have enough money to pay even half the bill!

The moral of the story is the people who pay the highest taxes do benefit more from a tax reduction.

However, if you tax them too much, they just won't come to the table anymore!

"MERRY CHRISTMAS!"

.

Answer 2

Heres my ugly take on this issue: Most supports of the current system ascribe also to the myth of upward mobility. In this country its part of the generally accepted mythology that you can be whatever you want to be. People tell their kids you could be president though there is no real supportive evidence for this historically. 1 poor president the rest rich people. The myth that all you need is game and you can be in the NBA. True enough it does happen but realistically you might as well get in the lottery. Its a farce and once it sinks into the minds of the average american they will begin to truely resent it. Right now they go to the movies and see Happyieness or some such propaganda about a guy with only the will to succeed. They need to tell the hundreds of stories where the same will meets defeat.

Answer 3

Bingo Freshmea!!!, THe fact that 10% of the people pay 60% of the taxes sounds bad, but they own over 70 % of the country, they should be playing at LEAST that much.
It is a sad state of affairs, but the top .01% of the people are worth more than the bottom 50%!!! Think about that, out of every 1000 people, the top guy has more wealth than the bottom 500!!!
As UNBELIEVABLE as that is, the rich guys on top, asking questions like these, apparently think the biggest problem in the country is that THE RICH PEOPLE AIN'T GOT ENOUGH MONEY!!! Jed to Jethro,' Pitiful...Pitiful..'.
We do not even have a 'middle class' anymore, after WW2, with the combined efforts of the unions and FDRs GI bill, a strong middle class began to develop and pretty much got stronger until the Reagan Administration. His firing of the air traffic controllers was sort of the' jump the shark'moment for a strong middle class, unions are no where near as strong as they were, and the lifestyle of millions of americans has gone down along with the unions.
It is almost hard to remember, I grew up in the 60s and early 70s in a union strong middle class, it was the norm for the dads to work 40 hours a week, maybe a little overtime if Christmas or vacation was coming up, the mom to stay at home and raise the kids, (what a concept), that same class family now, dad 55 hours, mom full time job, vacation??? yea..right, and kids?, dinners in the icebox see you at eight!!
I always get a laugh at the right wings feigned indignation of, class warfare, and redistribution of wealth, damn right there is class warefare and the top 1% is winning bigtime,redistribution of wealth, oh yea, again straight to the top!!!

Answer 4

What people dont realize is that this is going to lead to the rich becoming our rulers. Whoever pays the taxes, has the power. The tax system proposed by socialism is nothing more than revamped feudalism where us common people are the surfs and have no power while the rich ruling class are the nobles and have all the power.

Answer 5

The income tax on individual income "people that work for others is fine".
Now lets talk about all theses automobile dealers that sell us these shinny lactic automobiles, all these credit card companies, all these ships and barge lines, train transportation companies, airline companies, but true if they have to pay tax they will just pass it on to the consumer, US Right
Get an education or working harder, will that grantee everyone will be rich, if it did that that would be socialism you know.
The best thing for the people who are not rich it not to buy as tho you were

Answer 6

I personally would like to see the abolishment of the Income tax altogether. I don't have a problem with rich people paying small amounts of tax. My issue is with the government that thinks its better and more important than God who only asks for a tithe on increase.
The government asks for more than 10% which is ridiculous, and then it wants you to pay taxes on your home and vehicles each year after you've already paid taxes on them. Then it wants you to pay taxes on inheritance which already has been taxed when owned by
your benefactor and so on and so on, etc. etc. ad infinitum, ad naseum. ENOUGH ALREADY!
I Cr 13;8a

Answer 7

The number of thumbs downs on the intelligent answers terrifies me. I have heard it said, "Democrats love jobs, but hate employers." I have found this to be 100% true. They seem to think that if you own a business or employ people, you must have a back room where you hoard your secret ill-gotten millions. They think it takes extreme tax hikes to pry this money out of greedy business owners hands to keep the rest of us from starving in the streets. (The evidence of this thinking is in the first answerer's answer. He contends that the top 1% of earners in the US have in their possession 99% of all US currency and the rest of us try to eke out a meager existence with the remaining 1% of money printed by the US Mint.) They have no concept of overhead, business expenses, or how much the government is ALREADY raping business owners and the "evil rich." Who do they expect to employ people when the "rich" have been stripped of everything? For those of you who think the "rich" are not sufficiently fleeced, think about you own job and your own employer. What would happen to you if they suddenly had to pay double the taxes they do now, like Hillary is wanting? What would happen to you and your job? Do you think your evil boss would just have to begrudgingly fork over some more of those bundles from that back room, or do you think he would have to make some drastic cuts and sweeping changes to stay afloat? Maybe you would be the first one out on your @ss so your former salary could go to the government.

Moody- love the analogy! Keep 'em coming!

Answer 8

Freshmeat is pretty much on target. You have good data, but it does not tell the whole story. Also, you can find conflicting numbers. The old story that figures don't lie, but liars can figure.
The bottom 50% of wage earners (less than $26,000.) paid 4% of the total tax burden. The top 1% (over $293,000.) paid 34%.
The bottom line is that it seems about right to me. Any heavier taxes on the high wage earners is going to hurt their inititive, and remember that this top 1% is providing lots of jobs for the rest.

Answer 9

You say the richest 1% paid 39% of all income taxes, but what percentage of the wealth do they possess? You really need to know that in order to determine whether it's fair or not. For example, if the richest 1% have 99% of the wealth, then wouldn't you agree that they should bear a proportionally larger percentage of the tax burden?

"so YOU won't be happy until all their wealth is gone and they are just like you??...."

Um, where did I say this? I wasn't promoting an ideology. I was simply suggesting that you're cherry-picking statistics that need to be considered in a broader context.

Furthermore, why do you automatically assume I'm not wealthy and highly educated? Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, two of the richest men in the world, are in support of the wealthy bearing a larger tax burden than the poor.

Answer 10

How about just enough to pay for the war in Iraq? Shouldn't the ones who own the property be the ones who pay for protection of the property? No matter what you say, this protection is not being paid for, patriots. And the poor and middle class pay with their lives and military service.