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WASHINGTON — The Biden administration and congressional Democrats are moving toward dropping their push to raise corporate and individual income tax rates to pay for their sprawling domestic policy bill, instead drafting a plan that includes new ways to tax the wealthy and multinational corporations, according to people familiar with the discussions..... Mr. Biden had proposed paying for those programs by raising the top individual income tax rate to 39.6 percent from 37 percent and the corporate rate to 28 percent from 21 percent. Administration officials have said privately in recent weeks that they believed Ms. Sinema would eventually support...

Do you pay enough taxes? What is enough? When asked on "60 Minutes," Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez didn't seem to have a specific tax rate in mind, but then she said, "back in the '60s ... you see tax rates as high as 60 or 70 percent." Suddenly, 70 percent tax rates are a progressive plan, although Rep. Ilhan Omar added, "We've had it as high as 90 percent." She's right. That was the top tax rate when I was a kid, and today, many Democrats say if we'd just raise rates on rich people, government would have plenty of money...

Educators in ActionWorker Rights June 27, 2018 • 10:23AM Supreme Court Ruling in ‘Janus’ Deals Blow to Working Families By John Rosales The collective voice of American workers was undermined today by the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in ​Janus v. American Federation of County, State Municipal Employees. In a 5-to-4 decision, which casts aside decades of precedents and laws, the court has eliminated a public-sector union’s ability to collect “fair share” or “agency” fees from workers who choose not to join as union members but are still protected by union agreements. The ruling undermines the ability of educators to come...

Not what you've been told. Politicians exploit public ignorance. Few areas of public ignorance provide as many opportunities for political demagoguery as taxation. Today some politicians argue that the rich must pay their fair share and label the proposed changes in tax law as tax cuts for the rich. Let’s look at who pays what, with an eye toward attempting to answer this question: Are the rich paying their fair share? According to the latest IRS data, the payment of income taxes is as follows. The top 1 percent of income earners, those having an adjusted annual gross income of...

Okay, I've posted very few vanities during my time on FR, but this I believe is important for all FReepers and their relatives, who may be in the same situation. I signed up for health insurance as required under The Affordable Care Act, using the Healthcare.gov website in November of 2014. Up until that time, my employer provided my family health insurance at no cost to me, but because of the new law was unable to continue doing so for financial reasons. At that time, the Healthcare.gov website, after having entered my base salary numbers and my wife as sole...

Democrats keep demanding that the rich pay their “fair share” of income taxes. But they never say what fair is. Probably because they know that the rich pay huge amounts while 45% of households pay nothing. The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center has some eye-opening statistics on its site that should silence the “tax fairness” debate, if the numbers were widely known. For example, did you know that the richest 20% of households pay 88% of federal income taxes? Or that this is up from 64.7% the year before Reagan took office? Did you know that 45% of all households pay...

At the recent televised debate among candidates for the Democrats’ nomination for president, Hillary Clinton declared that “the wealthy pay too little” in taxes and “the middle class pays too much.” Some people might wish to argue about whether that is true or not, but no rational argument can be made on either side of this issue, because the words used are completely undefined. Nor is Hillary Clinton the only one who talks this way. It is one of the many signs of the mindlessness of our times that all sorts of people declare that “the rich” are not paying...

Suppose there were a banquet for 100 people and at the end of the night it was time to split the bill of $50 per person. If that bill were paid for the way we pay our income taxes, here is how it would work. Those in the top half of income would pay roughly $97 each and those in the bottom half of the income would pay an average of $3 each. Almost 40 people would pay nothing. And the single richest person in the room would cough up $1,750. Liberals would complain that the cheap skate rich guy...

In the debate over whether or not people should be forced to pay money to unions as a condition of employment, opponents of right-to-work laws often claim that workers who exercise their rights under the law are “freeloaders.” That is, that they are taking advantage of benefits from union bargaining while not paying their “fair share.” The Michigan Education Association, like most unions, supports collectively representing workers whether they are in the association or not because of the leverage it gives them at the bargaining table. Still, no private organization should have to provide benefits to people who aren’t paying...

Here is President Obama in a chat yesterday with CNBC’s Steve Liesman: STEVE LIESMAN: Mr. President, ... You’ve said a bunch of times that getting the wealthy to pay a little bit more, and you’ve succeeded in raising that top tax rate to 39% or rolling back the tax cuts. Is there a limit there? Is there a limit to how much you believe the government should take from an individual in terms of a top tax rate? PRESIDENT OBAMA: You know, I don’t have a particular number in mind, but if you look at our history we are still...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama paid $98,169 in taxes on $481,098 income last year, tax returns the White House released Friday show. They paid an effective federal income tax rate of 20.4 percent and donated significantly less to charity than they did the year before. The 42-page document, which included the couple's Illinois state income tax return, shows the Obamas reported donating $59,251 to 32 charities, which helped lower their overall tax bill. The nearly $60,000 in donations represents 12.3 percent of their adjusted gross income.

Because Enough is Enough Already. We've all seen them - the clickbait headlines that websites like Buzzfeed, ViralNova and UpWorthy use to drive traffic, especially through social networks. Even Huffington Post has jumped on the bandwagon of endless recycled listicles and bombastic titles. Downworthy replaces hyperbolic headlines from bombastic viral websites with a slightly more realistic version. For example: "Literally" becomes "Figuratively" "Will Blow Your Mind" becomes "Might Perhaps Mildly Entertain You For a Moment" "One Weird Trick" becomes "One Piece of Completely Anecdotal Horseshit" "Go Viral" becomes "Be Overused So Much That You'll Silently Pray for the Sweet Release...

This isn’t breaking news or anything, but it never ceases to amaze how swiftly politicians will throw much-maligned, greeedy big-oil companies and market speculators under the bus whenever gas prices begin a precipitous rise. Although the Obama administration is momentarily occupied with their headlining policy agenda (immigration, his umpteenth “pivot” to jobs and the economy, the healthcare rollout), there were several pointed provisions about energy in Obama’s budget proposal, and I have no doubt we’ll hear about the many supposed sins of oil companies and the need to forcibly wean ourselves off of fossil fuels with renewed vigor before long,...

President Obama a few months ago signed a bill to increase taxes by $600 billion. The title of the bill is the American Taxpayer Relief Act. As for the fourth word of that title, if you’re Obama, apparently you spell “relief” as follows: T-A-X-I-N-C-R-E-A-S-E. The president thereby achieved his goal of transferring more money away from the people who earned it with their labor over a lifetime and into the hands of people who earned it with their votes in November. As he relieved the former of the burden of their money, he thanked them: “I just want to thank...

“What’s the matter with Kansas?” syndrome of young people voting against their economic interests. Thus follows the constant courting of the hip and cool Beyoncé, Jay-Z, Lena Dunham, Occupy Wall Streeters, and others who blend pop culture, sex, youth, energy, and fad — almost anything to avoid the truth that today’s teenagers are starting out each owing a lifetime share of the national debt amounting to more than three-quarters of a million dollars. Those who ran up the debt enjoyed the borrowing, but won’t be around to pay back their proverbial fair share.

President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama paid $112,214 in federal taxes on $608,611 in income last year for a tax rate of 18.4 percent, which is slightly lower than the average rate paid by others in their income bracket. Most American households making between $500,000 and $1 million paid a 20.6 percent rate in 2012, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. In spite of the lower tax rate, the Obamas still managed to overpay taxes last year to the tune of $16,815, according to their tax returns, which were released by the White House on Friday.

<p>Put down your pitchforks. The wealthiest 10% pay a big majority of federal income taxes. Pick up your pitchforks. The story is more complicated than that.</p> <p>Many people think that the rich are able to weasel their way out of taxes, but they actually pay an overwhelming majority of the taxes in the United States. What's more, their share of the tax burden is increasing.</p>

Although Washington is gridlocked again over whether to raise taxes on the rich, wealthy families are already are paying some of their biggest federal tax bills in decades, while the rest of the population continues to pay at historically low rates. A new analysis shows that average tax bills for high-income families rarely have been higher since the Congressional Budget Office began tracking the data in 1979.

LOS ANGELES -- It is Academy Awards weekend in the nation's entertainment capital, and the 1 percenters are out in force. Wealth displays are running riot; robust consumption is the philosophical standard. I am staying at the legendary Hotel Bel-Air, a place where a cheeseburger and fries costs more than $30. Business is good. For most guests, money is no concern. They have it; they spend it. Life for the swells is sweet -- or at least they want you to think it is. President Obama has little use for these wealthy people, but strangely, many of them fervently love...