Taxing the wealthy the most isn’t about what’s fair - it’s about what is realistic

[hjmick]

A progressive tax system isn’t “punishing the rich” or being a freeloader poor person in comparison. It’s about what makes goddamn sense. Republicans can whine about Medicare/Medicaid I guess (until they need it and don’t admit it), but man do they love our defense budget. Bigger the better! Who cares if we have a shit load of tanks and airpower we’ll never use! It makes us look tough! Okay, sure, but guess what? That shit still has to be paid for. That revenue has to be generated realistically to match the high price tag. That revenue out of sheer necessity must come from the abundant wealth that rich people are hoarding because it’s not like the shrinking middle class or poor has the income to pay their fair share. Forget about a flat tax because it’s “fair”. That isn’t the point. It’s about what makes economic sense.

Billy after he's been on some weird stuff late at night, cranking up about rich people, GOP, yadda yadda:

Nah, as usual, my logic is undeniable.

It doesn't make sense. The gov't has no right to MORE of people's money just because they have MORE of it, Billy.

Make your "logical" case for that, if you dare.

It's not all the "people's money". The government simply printed it up. No one earned it. With this being the case why should it not be more equitably dispersed?

Why should some get money to buy a yacht but it's wrong for others to get some for an education?

Holy hell you're an ignorant one....

 

[pknopp]

A progressive tax system isn’t “punishing the rich” or being a freeloader poor person in comparison. It’s about what makes goddamn sense. Republicans can whine about Medicare/Medicaid I guess (until they need it and don’t admit it), but man do they love our defense budget. Bigger the better! Who cares if we have a shit load of tanks and airpower we’ll never use! It makes us look tough! Okay, sure, but guess what? That shit still has to be paid for. That revenue has to be generated realistically to match the high price tag. That revenue out of sheer necessity must come from the abundant wealth that rich people are hoarding because it’s not like the shrinking middle class or poor has the income to pay their fair share. Forget about a flat tax because it’s “fair”. That isn’t the point. It’s about what makes economic sense.

Billy after he's been on some weird stuff late at night, cranking up about rich people, GOP, yadda yadda:

Nah, as usual, my logic is undeniable.

It doesn't make sense. The gov't has no right to MORE of people's money just because they have MORE of it, Billy.

Make your "logical" case for that, if you dare.

It's not all the "people's money". The government simply printed it up. No one earned it. With this being the case why should it not be more equitably dispersed?

Why should some get money to buy a yacht but it's wrong for others to get some for an education?

No one earned it? Wow

Was that intended to be a rebuttal? If so, try again.

 

[LeftofLeft]

First, the GOP, despite its shallow libertarian droning about small government, spends like a 16 year old girl with Daddy's Gold Card. At least the Democrats are fiscally responsible enough to tax for the proceeds to use. You spend your way out of a financial catastrophe, as Obama was forced to do. You don't explode budgets in a period of growth, as Trump is.

Second, in any given economic system, there will always be individuals who are naturally, organically equipped to prosper significantly more within that system, and individuals who are not. An intelligent, prosperous, civilized society knows that you don't extravagantly reward only that select few and leave the rest to struggle. All that will inevitably lead to is...

....third, to steal a line from another poster, a smart socio-economic policy is valuable insurance against social revolution. The masses are human, and will only put up with increasing wealth disparity and income disparity for so long. At some point they will react, and when they do, it's human nature to over-react. The people below the top 5% vote, and they are paying attention.

Libertarian theory is fun 'n stuff, it has value as a general guardrail, but it's not realistic in the long run.
.

Democrats are like 16 year old girls who max out their daddy’s credit card and cry about fairness because their daddy has cut them off or suggested that they reduce their spending.

The only time Democrats talk about spending cuts is if involves DoD or Intelligence cuts. Republicans do spend but the also propose cuts. One of the best cutting proposals I heard came from the Republican aisle during the Bush era where every program, Defense and Intel included, do an across the board 5 percent cut. Democrats and liberals fought it tooth and nail.

Democrats have no leg to stand on when it comes to “fairness” and they refuse to seriously include cuts as part of the conversation.

 

[pknopp]

A progressive tax system isn’t “punishing the rich” or being a freeloader poor person in comparison. It’s about what makes goddamn sense. Republicans can whine about Medicare/Medicaid I guess (until they need it and don’t admit it), but man do they love our defense budget. Bigger the better! Who cares if we have a shit load of tanks and airpower we’ll never use! It makes us look tough! Okay, sure, but guess what? That shit still has to be paid for. That revenue has to be generated realistically to match the high price tag. That revenue out of sheer necessity must come from the abundant wealth that rich people are hoarding because it’s not like the shrinking middle class or poor has the income to pay their fair share. Forget about a flat tax because it’s “fair”. That isn’t the point. It’s about what makes economic sense.

Billy after he's been on some weird stuff late at night, cranking up about rich people, GOP, yadda yadda:

Nah, as usual, my logic is undeniable.

It doesn't make sense. The gov't has no right to MORE of people's money just because they have MORE of it, Billy.

Make your "logical" case for that, if you dare.

It's not all the "people's money". The government simply printed it up. No one earned it. With this being the case why should it not be more equitably dispersed?

Why should some get money to buy a yacht but it's wrong for others to get some for an education?

Holy hell you're an ignorant one....

Same here.

 

[mikegriffith1]

I wonder how many of the liberals who, as usual, are raging blindly against successful people (the rich) understand that under the Trump tax cuts, the rich pay a top marginal rate of 37% and that most liberals here probably fall into the second and third tax brackets, which means they pay a top marginal rate of only 12% or 15%. So the rich's top marginal income tax rate is about 200% higher than the rate paid by most middle-income people.

Furthermore, your average rich person who owns a home lost a huge tax break with the $10K cap on SALT deductions. A rich person with a home worth, say, $2 million, pays an average of about $30K in property taxes on that home, which means they lost a $20K tax break with the cap on SALT deductions imposed by the Trump tax cuts.

 

[Maxdeath]

You really have to love stupid. Even if we took every last cent of the hundred richest people in the U.S. It would only fund the U.S. For less then a full year without going over buget.

Crazy people always point to the 1950s or some other time and claim that there were higher taxes. There was but other taxes have been added since then. Deductions have been removed and most importantly state taxes have increased exponentially. States are still trying to increase those taxes because they have done so badly managing their budgets.

So few tend to realize that the extremely wealthy are not held in this country. They can leave at any time. The fact that they are invested in creating jobs never crosses anyones mind.
Add to this the fact that congress is the ones that write the tax code. The same ones that are rich, the same ones that create all the deductions because they don't want to tax themselves. But it sure does make for talking points to make small minds think that they are being cared for.

 

[pknopp]

I wonder how many of the liberals who, as usual, are raging blindly against successful people (the rich) understand that under the Trump tax cuts, the rich pay a top marginal rate of 37% and that most liberals here probably fall into the second and third tax brackets, which means they pay a top marginal rate of only 12% or 15%. So the rich's top marginal income tax rate is already over 200% higher than the rate paid by most middle-income workers.

That ignores those who make the vast amount of their money from capital gains.

 

[DBA]

Billy after he's been on some weird stuff late at night, cranking up about rich people, GOP, yadda yadda:

Nah, as usual, my logic is undeniable.

It doesn't make sense. The gov't has no right to MORE of people's money just because they have MORE of it, Billy.

Make your "logical" case for that, if you dare.

It's not all the "people's money". The government simply printed it up. No one earned it. With this being the case why should it not be more equitably dispersed?

Why should some get money to buy a yacht but it's wrong for others to get some for an education?

No one earned it? Wow

Was that intended to be a rebuttal? If so, try again.

Nothing else needs to be said. You very succinctly summed up Socialism. I am just astounded that some have come this far in the good ole' USA.

 

[pknopp]

Nah, as usual, my logic is undeniable.

It doesn't make sense. The gov't has no right to MORE of people's money just because they have MORE of it, Billy.

Make your "logical" case for that, if you dare.

It's not all the "people's money". The government simply printed it up. No one earned it. With this being the case why should it not be more equitably dispersed?

Why should some get money to buy a yacht but it's wrong for others to get some for an education?

No one earned it? Wow

Was that intended to be a rebuttal? If so, try again.

Nothing else needs to be said. You very succinctly summed up Socialism. I am just astounded that some have come this far in the good ole' USA.

Where does Quantitative Easing, bail outs, tariffs, etc fit into Capitalism?

 

[DBA]

I wonder how many of the liberals who, as usual, are raging blindly against successful people (the rich) understand that under the Trump tax cuts, the rich pay a top marginal rate of 37% and that most liberals here probably fall into the second and third tax brackets, which means they pay a top marginal rate of only 12% or 15%. So the rich's top marginal income tax rate is already over 200% higher than the rate paid by most middle-income workers.

That ignores those who make the vast amount of their money from capital gains.

So what do you propose? The long term capital gains tax is not income based. Do you propose changing the long term tax to mimic the short term tax and attach to ordinary income and brackets? Do you think this will discourage large investments and weaken the markets?

 

[DBA]

It doesn't make sense. The gov't has no right to MORE of people's money just because they have MORE of it, Billy.

Make your "logical" case for that, if you dare.

It's not all the "people's money". The government simply printed it up. No one earned it. With this being the case why should it not be more equitably dispersed?

Why should some get money to buy a yacht but it's wrong for others to get some for an education?

No one earned it? Wow

Was that intended to be a rebuttal? If so, try again.

Nothing else needs to be said. You very succinctly summed up Socialism. I am just astounded that some have come this far in the good ole' USA.

Where does Quantitative Easing, bail outs, tariffs, etc fit into Capitalism?

I am all for getting rid of the Federal Reserve and bail outs. Not sure how tarriffs fit or don't fit. They are unrelated IMO.

 

[mikegriffith1]

I wonder how many of the liberals who, as usual, are raging blindly against successful people (the rich) understand that under the Trump tax cuts, the rich pay a top marginal rate of 37% and that most liberals here probably fall into the second and third tax brackets, which means they pay a top marginal rate of only 12% or 15%. So the rich's top marginal income tax rate is already over 200% higher than the rate paid by most middle-income workers.

That ignores those who make the vast amount of their money from capital gains.

And what's the current capital gains tax rate? Hey? If you make a substantial amount of money from capital gains, as rich people do, your capital gains tax rate is 20%. If you're a middle-income person in the second or third bracket, your top marginal rate is 12% or 15%. 20% is 33% higher than 15%, so the rich whose incomes come from capital gains are paying a tax rate that's 33% higher than the rate paid by those in the third bracket, and it's 42% higher than the rate paid by those in the second bracket.

 

[pknopp]

I wonder how many of the liberals who, as usual, are raging blindly against successful people (the rich) understand that under the Trump tax cuts, the rich pay a top marginal rate of 37% and that most liberals here probably fall into the second and third tax brackets, which means they pay a top marginal rate of only 12% or 15%. So the rich's top marginal income tax rate is already over 200% higher than the rate paid by most middle-income workers.

That ignores those who make the vast amount of their money from capital gains.

So what do you propose? The long term capital gains tax is not income based. Do you propose changing the long term tax to mimic the short term tax and attach to ordinary income and brackets? Do you think this will discourage large investments and weaken the markets?

I'm willing to listen. You want to differentiate between long term and short term? O.K. but basically that is what Sanders Education plan was doing.

 

[SweetSue92]

A progressive tax system isn’t “punishing the rich” or being a freeloader poor person in comparison. It’s about what makes goddamn sense. Republicans can whine about Medicare/Medicaid I guess (until they need it and don’t admit it), but man do they love our defense budget. Bigger the better! Who cares if we have a shit load of tanks and airpower we’ll never use! It makes us look tough! Okay, sure, but guess what? That shit still has to be paid for. That revenue has to be generated realistically to match the high price tag. That revenue out of sheer necessity must come from the abundant wealth that rich people are hoarding because it’s not like the shrinking middle class or poor has the income to pay their fair share. Forget about a flat tax because it’s “fair”. That isn’t the point. It’s about what makes economic sense.

Billy after he's been on some weird stuff late at night, cranking up about rich people, GOP, yadda yadda:

Nah, as usual, my logic is undeniable.

It doesn't make sense. The gov't has no right to MORE of people's money just because they have MORE of it, Billy.

Make your "logical" case for that, if you dare.

It's not all the "people's money". The government simply printed it up. No one earned it. With this being the case why should it not be more equitably dispersed?

Why should some get money to buy a yacht but it's wrong for others to get some for an education?

WOW

 

[SweetSue92]

Why should some get money to buy a yacht but it's wrong for others to get some for an education?

A yacht can be pretty educational...

Counting???

 

[pknopp]

It's not all the "people's money". The government simply printed it up. No one earned it. With this being the case why should it not be more equitably dispersed?

Why should some get money to buy a yacht but it's wrong for others to get some for an education?

No one earned it? Wow

Was that intended to be a rebuttal? If so, try again.

Nothing else needs to be said. You very succinctly summed up Socialism. I am just astounded that some have come this far in the good ole' USA.

Where does Quantitative Easing, bail outs, tariffs, etc fit into Capitalism?

I am all for getting rid of the Federal Reserve and bail outs. Not sure how tarriffs fit or don't fit. They are unrelated IMO.

If you can't explain where tariffs fit into Capitalism, then it doesn't. We are not going to end the Fed. I agree, let's end public assistance and the Fed. I'm all for it. Reality though is we will not so I am not going to argue for the rich to get billions while taking the little the bottom gets away from them. Is that really something you support?

 

[pknopp]

I wonder how many of the liberals who, as usual, are raging blindly against successful people (the rich) understand that under the Trump tax cuts, the rich pay a top marginal rate of 37% and that most liberals here probably fall into the second and third tax brackets, which means they pay a top marginal rate of only 12% or 15%. So the rich's top marginal income tax rate is already over 200% higher than the rate paid by most middle-income workers.

That ignores those who make the vast amount of their money from capital gains.

And what's the current capital gains tax rate? Hey? If you make a substantial amount of money from capital gains, as rich people do, your capital gains tax rate is 20%. If you're a middle-income person in the second or third bracket, your top marginal rate is 12% or 15%. 20% is 33% higher than 15%, so the rich whose incomes come from capital gains are paying a tax rate that's 33% higher than the rate paid by those in the third bracket, and it's 42% higher than the rate paid by those in the second bracket.

Some people make their living off Capital Gains and some people actually have to work for a living. Those who work for a living should not have to pay a higher rate.

 

[pknopp]

A progressive tax system isn’t “punishing the rich” or being a freeloader poor person in comparison. It’s about what makes goddamn sense. Republicans can whine about Medicare/Medicaid I guess (until they need it and don’t admit it), but man do they love our defense budget. Bigger the better! Who cares if we have a shit load of tanks and airpower we’ll never use! It makes us look tough! Okay, sure, but guess what? That shit still has to be paid for. That revenue has to be generated realistically to match the high price tag. That revenue out of sheer necessity must come from the abundant wealth that rich people are hoarding because it’s not like the shrinking middle class or poor has the income to pay their fair share. Forget about a flat tax because it’s “fair”. That isn’t the point. It’s about what makes economic sense.

Billy after he's been on some weird stuff late at night, cranking up about rich people, GOP, yadda yadda:

Nah, as usual, my logic is undeniable.

It doesn't make sense. The gov't has no right to MORE of people's money just because they have MORE of it, Billy.

Make your "logical" case for that, if you dare.

It's not all the "people's money". The government simply printed it up. No one earned it. With this being the case why should it not be more equitably dispersed?

Why should some get money to buy a yacht but it's wrong for others to get some for an education?

WOW

If you have a rebuttal, make it. Replying like you did because you can not actually address what I said is not impressive.

 

[initforme]

As pric s rise, healthcare goes up, and wages still lag behind the middle class will continue to lose people.

 

[Mac1958]

First, the GOP, despite its shallow libertarian droning about small government, spends like a 16 year old girl with Daddy's Gold Card. At least the Democrats are fiscally responsible enough to tax for the proceeds to use. You spend your way out of a financial catastrophe, as Obama was forced to do. You don't explode budgets in a period of growth, as Trump is.

Second, in any given economic system, there will always be individuals who are naturally, organically equipped to prosper significantly more within that system, and individuals who are not. An intelligent, prosperous, civilized society knows that you don't extravagantly reward only that select few and leave the rest to struggle. All that will inevitably lead to is...

....third, to steal a line from another poster, a smart socio-economic policy is valuable insurance against social revolution. The masses are human, and will only put up with increasing wealth disparity and income disparity for so long. At some point they will react, and when they do, it's human nature to over-react. The people below the top 5% vote, and they are paying attention.

Libertarian theory is fun 'n stuff, it has value as a general guardrail, but it's not realistic in the long run.
.

Democrats are like 16 year old girls who max out their daddy’s credit card and cry about fairness because their daddy has cut them off or suggested that they reduce their spending.

The only time Democrats talk about spending cuts is if involves DoD or Intelligence cuts. Republicans do spend but the also propose cuts. One of the best cutting proposals I heard came from the Republican aisle during the Bush era where every program, Defense and Intel included, do an across the board 5 percent cut. Democrats and liberals fought it tooth and nail.

Democrats have no leg to stand on when it comes to “fairness” and they refuse to seriously include cuts as part of the conversation.

Since you immediately and completely changed the subject to the Democrats, I'll assume you don't disagree with my point.

The GOP had the White House, House and Senate, and it's STILL someone's else's fault. The buck always stops elsewhere.
.