A question for the tax knowledgeable:
We often hear how US individual taxes are lower than European taxes. Are these apples to apples comparisons? Does Europe have separate provincial, Social Security, unemployment fund income taxes? And does it have additional local taxes?
I realize that there are some other factors—US corporations are heavily taxes; capital gains are more heavily taxes; on the other hand, the European VAT tax probably outweighs our state sales taxes (which is why it’s been floated as a possibility for us).
Something else to watch for is the AMT.
If the AMT is not patched again, which I seriously doubt it will be, it will hit anyone making more than $45k/year.
I do believe europeans get a lot more “perks” from their employers that enable them to live comfortably before paying taxes
At least I know managers do, with cars, travel expenses, vacation expenses and other items that we pay out of pocket, as part of their compensation. I do not know what they pay in health premiums above the built-in socialized medicine costs
The “secret” to eurosocialism is the VAT. It builds in inflation is everything. Luckily we don’t have a VAT here(yet).
Don’t know about individual tax rates, but US corporate rates are now the highest in the world. Either a corporation “joins” the mob in DC...or they’re run offshore at this point.
http://money.cnn.com/2012/03/27/pf/taxes/corporate-taxes/index.htm