Mike said:
Larry, Tex is having a very hard time understanding that the poor pay no income taxes. According to some, the top 1% pays more than the bottom 90% combined.
And 50% of the people pay none.
http://www.parapundit.com/archives/004657.html
Wealthy people bad.
Corporations bad.
Try finding a poor, broke corporation to give you a job.
No, Mike, I totally understand it.
Separating the taxes out by income tax, SS tax, medicare tax, gas tax, etc., is only marketing. They are all taxes. The tax rate is not just the income tax rate but the over all tax rate for all of these items together. One could make lots of arguments about this tax or that tax but all of the federal taxes go together in one big pie. It doesn't matter what the label on those taxes are. They go to fund the federal government.
The fact is that when all of these taxes are combined, the rich are, like Buffet said, coddled. They pay less of their income in these taxes as a percent of income largely because we have a low capital gains tax.
I don't mind having a low capital gains tax on say the first 1 million dollars per person. After that, the other tax payers are paying the taxes or assuming the debt that these guys are not paying. We are subsidizing them getting very very wealthy and paying more as a percent of income in taxes. Buffet pointed this out even as he was taking advantage of it himself and he said it was a bad policy for the nation.
I agree.
It isn't about wealthy people being bad although I think Mark Twain had it correct in his quote, it is about other people paying more in percent of total taxes.
I really don't see why so many people support this. It is some kind of whacko thinking of protecting the rich and the wealthy and giving them advantages the average guy or gal does not have.
Corporations are not inherently bad but some of them are bad and get away with being bad because they do control so much wealth in the country. That is the rule of men, not the rule of law.
You seem to be just as quick to argue for coddling these people and making excuses for them.
I simply do not.
Tex