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Caterpillar: Goodbye Illinois, Hello Indiana’s Right To Work February 17, 2012 Caterpillar digging into Indiana Caterpillar has been a mainstay Illinois-based company for generations but no longer. The power and influence of big labor has impacted the company for too long, damaging its bottom-line and hurting workers. Now that Illinois’ neighbor, Indiana, has become a Right to Work state, Caterpillar is exploring their options, according to The Detroit News’ Robert Laurie: Back in 2009, Barack Obama announced that Caterpillar had promised to rehire some of its laid-off workforce if his stimulus proposal passed. This week, the nation’s largest manufacturer of...

When Ron Paul talks about repealing the income tax and replacing it with nothing, most people think it can’t be done. But at least on the state level, it can. In fact, there are nine states, including Paul’s home state of Texas, that don’t levy income taxes. Those states have far outperformed high-income-tax states on every measure of economic success. Now Oklahoma is poised to fully repeal its income tax and join the ranks of non-income-tax states. While Oklahoma is already a relatively business-friendly, low-tax state, income-tax repeal would launch it into the top tier of the most economically competitive...

Where Does Your Tax Money Go Ever wonder where your tax dollars are spent each year? The table below provides a summary of government tax spending percentages applied to the tax you paid in. Your Money Is Spent On Your Share % National Defense $4,176 20% Veterans and Foreign Affairs $835 4% Medicaid, Food Stamps, and Related Programs $3,340 16% Unemployment and Social Services $1,879 9% Social Security, Medicare, and Other Retirement $7,516 36% Net Interest on the Debt $1,253 6% Law Enforcement and General Government $418 2% Physical, Human, and Community Development $1,461 7% Total Paid $20,878 100%

The 1913 Income Tax In 1913 the 16th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified. It was a fairly short amendment, as such things go, weighing in at a whopping 30 words. It reads as follows: The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several states, and without regard to any census of enumeration. It was a simple little thing, with rather large consequences for the republic. Prior to the income tax being instituted, the United States government managed to fund itself with various excise taxes, and...

We'll leave it to others to assess the political fallout from Mitt Romney's statement yesterday that he paid about 15% in federal income taxes. But let's at least get some facts straight. On Morning Joe today, Joe Scarborough claimed that the revelations about Mitt Romney's taxes might be his Dukakis-in-the-tank moment. Scarborough repeated the shibboleth Warren Buffett put into circulation that at 15%, the super-rich like Romney pay a lower tax rate than secretaries. But is that so? Running the numbers suggest otherwise. See video and analysis here.

This is America’s 100th year for individual income tax, a system as out of touch with our era as digital music is with the hand-cranked Victrola music players of 1912. It is also the 26th year of the Reagan-era reform for both personal and corporate tax, a grand design now buried under special-interest favors. With U.S. elections in November, and the George W. Bush tax cuts due to expire at the end of 2012, it’s time for a debate that goes beyond ginning up anger over taxes and the superficial issue of tax rates. It’s time to consider whether to...

>How much money will you really take home from your paycheck in 2012? To find out, we've created the tool here so you can run the numbers that matter the most for you! In addition to finding out how much money Uncle Sam will be taking straight out of your paycheck for income tax withholding and FICA (which we've broken down into your Social Security and Medicare tax components), our tool will also work in your 401(k) or 403(b) retirement plan contributions, as well as the effect of any flexible spending account arrangements you may have set up through your employer....

Gov. Jerry Brown has formally proposed a $7 billion a year increase in sales and income taxes to close the state's chronic budget deficit. Whether it will be the only tax increase on the November ballot is uncertain. Several others are in the works, and if they reach the ballot as well, voter confusion could doom all. But assuming that Brown's stands alone, how would the campaign shape up? By next year, he presumably will have pulled the spending cut "triggers" built into the 2011-12 budget because revenues are not meeting its extremely optimistic levels, which would mean schools, colleges...

We live in interesting times. Even as our own civilization hangs on the precipice of financial solvency, the priorities of the uninformed masses as so distorted that many will actually camp out in front of a Best Buy store in order to be the first in line to save $100 on a big-screen TV. In a time when the very problems of society are rooted in over-consumption and too much television, the everyday pleebs place such high importance on expanding the size of their mainstream media hypnosis devices that they will physically fight each other to get one of these...

DES MOINES, Iowa - Republican presidential hopeful Michele Bachmann is telling college students in politically important Iowa that all Americans should pay taxes since they all benefit from services such as roads and bridges, national defense and the courts. Her position, which she was outlining today at Iowa State University in Ames, is a direct challenge to rivals Rick Perry and Herman Cain, who are advocating plans that would allow low-wage earners to continue paying no taxes while implementing a form of a flat tax on all other workers. The Tax Policy Center estimates that some 46 percent of households...

Full title: Buffett Discloses $62,855,038 In 2010 Gross Income, $39,814,784 In Taxable Income, And $6,923,494 In Federal Taxes Excerpt: "Following a back and forth between Kansas Congressman Tim Huelskamp, we have now discovered what, according to Buffett, were the precise amounts of the Octogenarian Crony Capitalist of Omaha's 2010 gross income, taxable income and Federal tax respectively. These are as follows: $62,855,038, $39,814,784 and 6,923,494. This, apparently, was not enough for Huelskamp. The debate continues below."

....Of Mr. Cain's many ideas, the most well-known -- in part because of its clever sound-bite name -- is his 9-9-9 plan which aims to replace most current federal taxes (including income tax, death tax, payroll tax, capital gains taxes, and double-taxation of dividends) with a 9% flat tax for business income, a 9% flattax for individual income, and a 9% national salestax. The plan would eliminate almost all deductions. While Mr. Cain's consistent results-oriented approach is admirable -- not least for its contrast with the other candidates -- voters should be wary of the 9-9-9 plan despite its initial...

Herman Cain’s 9-9-9 proposal — a 9 percent personal-income tax, a 9 percent corporate-income tax, and a 9 percent federal sales tax, to replace all current federal taxes — is attractive in many ways. It is not a flat tax, but it is a flattish tax; it eliminates some (but by no means all) of the divide-and-conquer features of the federal tax code; it simplifies taxes for most households and many businesses; it might reduce compliance costs. All to the good. A few things should be understood about the 9-9-9 plan. The first is that 9-9-9 is not Herman Cain’s...

The United States tax code is so backward that billionaire investor Warren Buffett pays only 17 percent in income taxes, a rate even lower than that of his secretary. Or so he claims. While I have great respect for Mr. Buffett, and while I agree that our tax code could benefit from major adjustments, Mr. Buffett's statement is misleading. And he knows it. Even worse, when Mr. Buffett implies that wealthier Americans are under-taxed, it gives public officials cover to pursue disastrous policies such as Maryland's failed millionaire's tax, and the pending sales tax on interstate Internet purchases known as...

Prospective presidential candidate Michele Bachmann says she wants a national sales tax, but can’t vote for it because she believes Congress would just add it to the current income tax system. In a profile in The Wall Street Journal, Bachmann says she loves the FAIR tax proposal but just cannot bring herself to back it in the House. “If we were starting over from scratch, I would favor a national sales tax," the three-term Minnesota congresswoman says. But the reality is that if it were enacted, the chances are “we would end up with a dual tax, a national sales...

Adele's not happy about her tax bill. The British soul singer, whose 2008 debut album, 19, was certified four times platinum in the UK, wasn't afraid to voice her frustrations about having to pay so much in taxes and according to her, receiving so little in return. According to the New York Daily News, fans are not to pleased about her complaints to a British magazine about how much she has to pay in taxes. Adele recently told Q magazine, "I'm mortified to have to pay 50 percent!," she said."[While] I use the NHS, I can't use the public transport...

There’s an informative story in the paper that concluded corporations are encouraged by the tax code “to stash hundreds of billions in profits overseas…” Gee, who would have guessed? Of 25 Orange County-based California corporations, “most pay less than the official rate, sometimes far less.” We’ve made the case for years that when taxes are raised on corporations, the outcome is predictable . . .

Unemployment is rising, the federal government is broke, and so are many of the states. Now more than ever America needs its various governments to exercise restraint, and to scale-back on spending. And in the midst of this environment a stunning proposal has emerged in the nearly insolvent state of California: a third income tax. The proposal is actually worse than a mere “additional” income tax – and I’ll explain this in a moment. First let’s look at the “other two” income taxes. For the record, if you’re an American and you work and you earn personal income, your U.S....

As President Barack Obama pushes to raise income taxes on high earners, opponents are seizing on data that indicates these U.S. households already pay a large and growing share of taxes, even compared with high-tax European countries. And a new congressional study concludes that the percentage of U.S. households owing no federal income tax climbed to 51% for 2009. Republicans are expected to highlight these figures at a congressional hearing Tuesday. They oppose Mr. Obama's proposal to increase taxes for high earners, defined as families making more than $250,000 per year, as a way to help close large federal budget...

The fastest way to make the tax-averse incensed is to tell them that nearly half of U.S. households end up owing no federal income tax when all is said and done. But like most statistics, it is often misunderstood -- and, in the case of those trying to stir political outrage, misrepresented. For tax year 2010, roughly 45% of households, or about 69 million, will end up owing nothing in federal income tax, according to estimates by the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. Some in that group will even end up getting paid money from the federal government. That does not...

Reflections on Tax Day, 2011: You and I are too young to remember… heck, our parents and grandparents were too young to remember… but we’ve seen the scene in old movies: A huckster, a showman, traveling from town to town with a covered wagon or buggy, singing the praises of some impossible patent medicine. “It cures gout, reverses balding, and repairs broken limbs!” or “Too short? Grow four inches taller at any age!” or “Tired and listless? Weak and frail? This bottle of liquid magic will fix anything!” And he’d stand on his soapbox and sell one-dollar bottles of spring...

Since Obama is starting up the "tax the rich" dogma again, I thought it was time to discuss exactly how much taxes the "rich" are paying. The Congressional Budget Office publishes a great deal of information about how the federal tax burden is distributed, and compiles all of it at the cited link. It provides data from 1979 to 2007, adjusted to 2007 dollars so that you can compare how it has changed, without worrying about inflation. However, I discovered that someone has taken all this information and created a series of graphs that make it much easier to understand:...

SACRAMENTO, Calif -- SACRAMENTO, Calif. - Many same-sex couples are getting a tax break this year from the IRS, according to new requirements to report their combined income on federal tax returns. Under "income splitting," the IRS is requiring all same-sex married couples or registered domestic partners in Washington state, California and Nevada to divide their combined income equally and report it on their separate tax returns. For some couples, it will mean more money in their 2010 refund; for others, they'll pay more in taxes. Either way, the change is significant, both monetarily and emotionally, officials of Lambda Legal,...

I need some advice from some fellow Freepers who may be able to give me some. I am filling out my tax form, I using the 1040A tax form. While filling it out I am directed to a form that is called Schedule M. I found out I qualified for it last year, after I paid my taxes. The IRS sent my wife and I a check for $500.00 with a letter stating we failed to use schedule m which qualified us for an additional deduction. Personally I think it was a way for the democrats to buy votes....

Rep. Marv Hagedorn, R-Meridian, wants to reduce personal and business income taxes in Idaho, lure businesses to the state, and ultimately increase overall tax revenues for Idaho and he is getting support for his plan in a big way. Gov. Butch Otter backed the proposal in his State of the State address in at the Capitol in Boise Monday, mentioning Hagedorn by name. Hagedorn’s bill is a 10-year plan that would lower personal and corporate income taxes in the state to a flat 4.9 percent, making it one of the lowest rates in the United States. Otter thinks the plan...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Itemize your tax deductions? Itching for a refund? You're going to have to wait. The IRS said that it needs until mid- to late-February to reprogram its processing systems because Congress acted so late this year cleaning up the tax code. The bill, which includes deductions for state and local sales taxes, college tuition and teacher expenses, wasn't signed into law until Dec. 17. The bill ensured that the federal income tax rates would not change, and itemized deductions will continue to be allowed in full for high-income taxpayers. As a result, the 50 million taxpayers...

Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is reported to be "irked" that President Obama didn't take his advice and use the tax bill to "corner Republicans into defending millionaires and billionaires."  In fact, Schumer's not just irked -- he's "deeply disappointed and convinced Obama had missed a major opportunity."  You'll remember that Schumer's plan was to continue the Bush tax cuts for everyone except those earning more than $1 million a year. Presumably, Chuck is upset about income trends showing the income share of the very richest rising in recent years.  Here is data from the IRS showing that the top...

The Democrats resent their recent losses and propose to take their anger out on American taxpayers — with a massive tax hike presented as a compromise on extending the Bush tax rates. It may be bad news for taxpayers, investors, the jobless, and the economy at large, but the Democrats’ intransigent insistence on sticking to their class-warfare platform is excellent news for incoming Republicans, inasmuch as it suggests that the Democrats still have not figured out exactly why the nation visited an almighty shellacking upon them on Election Day. Many congressional Democrats first wanted to undo what they still insist...

No question about it -- we are in deep trouble. Unemployment, manufacturing being killed here and jobs moving overseas, unrestrained spending and the resultant deficits being given cover by more and more printing press “money” and the inflation – or worse – that almost always follows, etc., etc. And when the new – ostensibly conservative -- members of Congress take their seats in January, we will only see the beginning of the long and painful process of retracing our steps back to Constitutional and fiscal sanity. It points to the fact that much of our trouble stems from a failure...

California’s business tax climate is second worst in the nation, better only than New York’s, according to a new report from the Tax Foundation. New Jersey managed to move up two spots on the list after four straight years as the nation’s worst business tax climate... The index is based on the premise that taxes matter to business and states don’t raise or lower taxes in a vacuum. “The modern market is characterized by mobile capital and labor. Therefore, companies will locate where they have the greatest competitive advantage...

After months of work and anticipation, [Puerto Rico] Gov. [Luis] Fortuño finally unveiled his administration’s comprehensive tax reform. At the center of the measure is an across-the-board reduction in the individual tax bracket that would result in a 49-percent overall savings in six years. Corporate reductions are slated to reach 30 percent. The cornerstone of the tax modification is the reduction of the income tax brackets. People making less than $20,000 would not pay any tax. The bracket of those making $20,001 to $30,000 would be taxed 7 percent. From $30,001 to $70,000, the allocation would be 14 percent. The...

Just days before Washington state voters decide whether to impose a first-ever state tax on six-figure incomes, Texas Gov. Rick Perry has jumped into the middle of the fray. With a week to go before the Washington ballot initiative, Perry, a Republican, has taken an unusually aggressive swipe at Gov. Chris Gregoire, a Democrat. Perry sent letters Friday to 90 leading businesses in Washington – including Amazon, Microsoft and Starbucks – inviting them to relocate to Texas, which also has no income tax. "If Washington doesn't want your business, Texas does,” said Perry. “Texas has no personal income tax and...

A new filing by the state's Public Disclosure Commission reveals that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer is now Defeat 1098's biggest donor, and it's not even close. After giving "only" $100,000 in September to the campaign to prevent a high-earner's income tax, Ballmer significantly upped the ante by donating $325,000 on October 11. Also joining the check-cutting crew: Microsoft itself, which donated $75,000. That means both Bill Gates, junior and senior, are for, while Ballmer and the company he runs are against. What's that they say about a divided house? Structurally sound? Naw, that couldn't be right.

Over the years a lot of suspicion has built up across the country about Washington and its population of opportunistic transients coming to see themselves as a special kind of person, somehow above average working Americans who don't work down in that former swamp. Well, finally, an end to all those undocumented doubts. Thanks to some diligent digging by the Washington Post, those suspicions can at last be put to rest. They're correct. Accurate. Dead-on. Laser-guided. On target. Bingo-bango. As clear as it's always seemed to those Americans who don't feel special entitlements and do meet their government obligations. We...

NEW DELHI: Lowering tax slabs have always generated higher revenue. The results were too encouraging as successive governments rationalized and made stable rates. Over the last few decades gross tax revenue has gone up by almost three to five times from Rs 1.11 lakh crore in 1995-96 to Rs 3.05 lakh crore in 2004-05 and to Rs 6.26 crore in 2009-10. The tax collection as percentage of GDP too has shown an upward trend. From 9.4% of GDP in 2004-05 it peaked to 12% of GDP in 2007-08 and slowed down due to global financial meltdown in 2008-09 but still...

Where will your taxes be for 2011? http://www.mytaxburden.org/

Did you know there are nine states that have no state income tax? The non-income-tax states (see accompanying chart) are geographically and economically diverse, ranging from the state of Washington in the Pacific Northwest, to Texas and Florida in the South, and up to New Hampshire in the Northeast. Why is it that some of the states with the biggest fiscal problems have the highest individual state income tax rates, such as New York and California, while some of the states with the least fiscal problems have no state income tax at all? High-tax advocates will argue that the high-tax...

On Wednesday Gary posted the list “Five Truths that Liberals Hate,” and it proved one of the most popular posts we’ve had in a while. While in total agreement with those ideals, and actually probably the most conservative guy at American Vision, I thought a little Tabasco for the Right was in order as well. So let’s hear it: five truths Republicans hate. 1. Most Republicans are as socialist as the Left. While not as socially liberal as the left—not advocating equality, gay rights, feminism, etc., etc.—Republicans have proven every bit as fiscally liberal with the exception of the last...

It is a truly tragic development that in America -- a country founded on the principle of the inviolability of private property -- half of us prey on the substance of our neighbors. A striking 37-second video moment made it to the internet last week. It was taken at a demonstration of public-sector unions in Springfield, Illinois marching in support of the proposed tax increases in that state. The clip features a public school teacher, an African-American lady, who carries a couple of placards while shouting: "Where is the money? Where is the money? ... Give up the bucks! Where...

Like Giannoulias, Brady sees himself a victim of economy Before Friday, I never realized how much Bill Brady, the conservative Republican nominee for governor, and Alexi Giannoulias, the liberal Democratic nominee for senator, had in common -- other than being wealthier than most folks. Then Brady, a state senator from Bloomington and partner in an extensive family-owned real estate business, revealed he and his wife paid no federal income taxes in 2008 or 2009. That's right, not a dime. A few hours later, bank regulators closed the doors on the Giannoulias family-owned Broadway Bank in Chicago, its failure costing the...

New Zealand’s centre-right government is considering cutting income tax rates and increasing the goods and services tax when it releases its budget next month as part of its efforts to rebalance the economy and make the country more internationally competitive. ... The Financial Times understands that the government will almost certainly increase the goods and services tax from 12.5 per cent to 15 per cent, to discourage excessive consumption, while cutting income tax rates.

When liberals advocate a value-added tax, conservatives should respond: Taxing consumption has merits, so we will consider it — after the 16th Amendment is repealed. A VAT will be rationalized as necessary to restore fiscal equilibrium. But without ending the income tax, a VAT would be just a gargantuan instrument for further subjugating Americans to government. Believing that a crisis is a useful thing to create, the Obama administration — which understands that, for liberalism, worse is better — has deliberately aggravated the fiscal shambles that the Great Recession accelerated. During the downturn, federal revenues plunged and spending soared. And,...

Are you a giver or a taker? No, that is not a bad pickup line from an Internet dating site — it's a question every American should be asking themselves these days. "Do I take more than I give?" I'm sure most of us want to be considered givers, not takers. After all, we grew up with the old adage that "it is better to give than receive." But we all know people who are more takers than givers. We've all seen someone who brings a small salad to the potluck but piles lots of your casserole on his...

I posted a somewhat shorter version of this in a previous thread. I have been asked to expand it to a full post. Americans are now working their way through their tax forms and making valiant attempts to avoid using “colorful” language in reference to the tax people. For you this is a warning. If you have never had problems with the IRS you are very fortunate but rest assured you are in their crosshairs. The following is an experience I have had with the friendly, accessible government services that will be the template for the ever expanding O-care bureaucracy....

Fiscal Policy: The latest data show a record number of people with no tax obligation. We also have the highest-earning nontaxpayers ever. With more riding the wagon and fewer pulling, it should soon break down. A record number of the 142 million tax returns filed in 2008 resulted in no taxes owed, according to the Tax Foundation's analysis of the latest IRS data. About 51.6 million returns, or 36.3%, were filed by those whose deductions, exemptions and tax credits wiped out any federal income-tax obligation. These aren't people who have overpaid their taxes or had so much withheld from their...

The letter that Ralph Groves, director of the U.S. Census Bureau, recently sent to the American people reflects what America has become under the welfare state. Here is what the letter states in part: "Your response is important. Results from the 2010 Census will be used to help each community get its fair share of government funds for highways, schools, health facilities, and many other programs you and your neighbors need. Without a complete, accurate census, your community may not receive its fair share." In that one paragraph lies the plunderbund society in all it majestic glory. Everyone is supposed...

A record number of the 142 million tax returns filed in 2008 resulted in no tax payment, according to a Tax Foundation analysis of IRS data. That means the tax filers got back every dollar that had been withheld from their paychecks, and often more. Roughly 51.6 million tax returns, or 36.3 percent, were filed by such "nonpayers," people whose exemptions, deductions and credits wiped out any federal income tax due. A family of four earning more than $50,000 can have no income tax liability after taking the standard deduction and the child tax credit. "Two records were set in...

More states considering holding individual 2009 tax refunds until August/September. Other states to garnish wages for taxes due.

This year, more Americans and businesses may be asking: Where's my tax refund? That's because cash-strapped states such as North Carolina, Alabama and Hawaii have been forced to slow down issuing income tax refunds to individuals and businesses because of a lack of funds in their budget. Kansas has hinted that a delay might be possible, and processing paper refunds in Iowa has slowed because the state doesn't haven't enough employees to get them processed faster. Another state, New York, is still considering whether they'll follow the likes of Hawaii and delay refund payments.

Not only is Harry Reid a jerk (see Alan's latest post), but clearly he’s also a moron. Not sure when this video was made, looks like it was posted online in 2008. Try not to drink a beverage as you watch this, or you may end up with a ruined keyboard or monitor... [video that has to be seen to be believed]