I worked out this response to someone else on another forum that didn't like it when I said that the tax money spent on bailouts and other wasteful government spending wasn't actually their money. He called my statement a popular spin and went on about how the rich actually pay a lower percentage of income tax than other people. All of my numbers came from the Summary of Federal Individual Income Tax Data 2010. This was my response:




No. Looking at percentages is a popular spin. 10% at even $250k is a whole hell of a lot more than 20% on $50k. How much is enough? When has the government taken enough of someones money? Let us look at some actual numbers.

The top 1% of earners already pay 38.02% of taxes or $280,185 each. You site extreme examples of low income tax percentages but according to the IRS the average income tax rate for this group of people is 23.27%. Bring it out to the top 5% of earners and you are at 58.72% of the taxes with an average income tax percentage of 17.21% for the 1-5%ers and $38,148 each. By the time you get down to the top 25% of earners(people making more than $67,280) you are at 86.34% of taxes. The top half pay 97.3% of taxes or an average of $14,341 per person. The bottom half pays just 2.7% or an average of $398 per person with their 2.59% tax rate.

Now lets look at total shares of adjusted gross income. The top 1% only earns 20% of the income compared to their 38.02% share of taxes. The 1-5% group makes 14.73% of AGI but pays 20.7% of taxes. Drop down to the entire top 25% and they make 67.38% compared to the 86.34% they pay for.

This doesn't even look at state income tax, sales tax, property tax, capital gains tax, or any of the other hundreds of ways they are taxed. Then lets try not to forget that all of these people are excluded from the majority of the services these taxes pay for. They get nothing from their contributions but demands for more contributions. You want to act is if these people aren't paying their fair share but they are indirectly carrying entire families on their backs. The top 1% can carry small towns. In just one year one person from the top 1% pays what almost 14 of the bottom 50%ers pays across their entire lifetime assuming they work from the age of 16 to the full SS retirement age of 67 and never break into the top 50%.

It is no wonder they hire illegals, ship jobs overseas, and churn out products designed to wear out every few years. Why shouldn't they? The bottom half are just going to need more of their money. I am surprised more and more of them don't just say enough and throw in the towel and live out the rest of their lives on a beach somewhere.

I personally believe there should be a cap on the max. amount of taxes anyone single person can pay, per year. Combine that with equal, as in everyone pays, tax payments and we would be doing good. However, most average people don't want that, and the pols sure as hell don't, nor do the near 50% of people that don't pay any taxes.



I once got pissed at someone saying "working is for suckers". Each day, I am beginning to understand that mentality. Whats the point of working, when you lose 50% of your income to the gov, so they can give it to someone you wouldn't piss on if they were on fire.

That would be an excellent idea.  Can you imagine how hard people would work once they know every dime they earn from here until the end of the year is theirs?

Yep, especially when you consider things like OT, performance bonuses, etc. I know guys that refuse to work OT, because by the time the tax man gets theirs, they get a couple extra bucks at the cost of not having a life. Uncle Sam gets more benefit from that OT than the guy working it when you figure the loss of time with family, the extra stress, lack of sleep, etc.





ETA:





And that mentality, leads businesses to have to hire more people, even if part timers, to fill the void. That makes more taxes for the businesses to have to pay on those new employees, which just snowballs all the way down the chain. Or they chose to reduce their expansion so as not to need the extra hours. Either way, it ends up hurting the economy.
 

Correct, if the bush tax cuts had expired, those in the bottom brackett, 10% would be bumped to the new lowest brackett, 15%, that is a 50% increase in tax with holdings each paycheck.

The stays at home and takes care of the kid because of this. After paying for daycare and the extra taxes she would be working for free, or a couple 100 bucks a week. Why bother? I can work OT and make out much better.

And 49% of the people pay no income taxes or get back more than they paid in

Flat tax.


1911fan

Fair Tax