Posted on 08/01/2011 6:46:11 PM PDT by yetidog
Forgive me for asking…but what is so wrong about raising taxes to some negotiated extent on the most wealthy taxpayers in the US? While I know this question violates conservative orthodoxy, there are a lot of folks in the US who make a lot of money…some of it easily earned (inherited), some of it by talent (professional athletes), some of it by luck (actors and lottery winners) and some of it by a lot of hard work and perseverance. Now I agree that $250,000 is not the place to start, but maybe 5 million (or some other negotiable figure and percentage) is. And I know that revenue gained from “raising taxes on the rich” is a mere drop in the bucket, but an negotiated agreement to do so would destroy a persistent liberal argument that makes a lot of sense to many voters in the country. Not every rich person is the key to unemployment nor or they particularly deserving of protection because they are among the 5% or so that pay 80% of the taxes. This is not a matter of class envy nor income distribution, rather it addresses about the only rational argument that liberals still have in the ongoing fiscal policy debate.
You signed up in 2004 to do an opus just now?
You commie classists — punish those that work hard (or their progeny): that’ll teach em!
How about because they will not invest their money here and will move it offshore or to trusts like the Kennedys. For every action there is a reaction.
$1 trillion over 10 years is a fricken joke. Everyone in DC who voted for the bill in the House want more spending because that’s what the bill does. It locks in more gov’t spending and creates more taxes across the board.
A better answer is to make the 50% of people who pay no tax start paying. The higher income earners already pay far more than their share.
Let the moochers put some skin in the game.
The real question is: Why do almost half the people in this country pay no income tax? Time for them to get “some skin in the game”.
How about the top rate starts at $1 in income? And folks who get more from the government than they contribute can't vote! Such an arrangement would ensure that the tax remained reasonable, since everybody able to vote would also feel the pain.
It’s probably Bill O’Reilly. He’s been keeping an eye on us since 2004.
Oh, I forgot: IBTZ
It's wrong because it won't work. You could take all their money and it won't work. That's the existential side of it. The moral side of it is why should they pay more? Because they can?
As an aside, what ever happened to equal protection under the law? How is a progressive tax not unconstitutional?
No revenues? You haven’t been following closely. The assumptions in this bill and by the CBO are that the Bush tax cuts expire Jan 1/13. There you go, a tax increase which you will be paying too.
As does a consumption tax but the flaw in both is it wouldn't allow our political class to manipulate our taxes for their own benefit.
The solution is to starve the beast, not to gorge it with dessert. Every last dollar of spending excess has to be wrung out of the economy before we consider revenue increases.The modus operandi of Dem Party when they take control is to unleash spending calculating that they will spend us into a hole.Step 2 is to then go back to the public and tell them we have a revenue problem and that we need to tax those who do not vote for them. Yielding to Democrat impulses to “tax the rich” implicitly suggests that the revenue problem is on an equal footing with the spending problem.They are not.
“First, they came for the billionaires. And I didn’t have a billion dollars, so I didn’t speak up for them.”
Even if the rich pay 99% of their income, it'll never be enough for the democrats//liberals/socialists/communists/Marxists.
When do the poor/disadvantaged/downtrodden have enough?
Where is it written that we have an obligation to provide anything beyond subsistence to those who will not make an effort to provide for themselves.
I'm sick and tired of having to pay taxes to provide gold plated benefits for those who won't lift a finger to help themselves.
/rant off
Nope, it's still stealing private property. At least with a sales tax people have some choice over their taxation. All of this is academic, though, because almost no congressman will give up the power to tinker with the tax code, and people have accepted graduated taxes as fair. Socialism is now the norm.
Top 1% paying 38% of the tax bill; top 5% with 59%; top 25% paying 87% ... while 47% of Americans pay nothing.
Come up with a plan to get the non-paying 47% in the game and get back to us.
“Maybe you should be asking why do 48% pay no federal taxes whatsoever.”
I agree. Everyone should pay some amount of federal tax.
>>It’s probably Bill O’Reilly. He’s been keeping an eye on us since 2004.<<
I stopped watching and listening to him — he wants to beloved so much he has no moral compass at all.
I think Rush accurately said O’Reilly is Ted Baxter.
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