Why We Must Raise Taxes on the Rich, ASAP!

[Rick Rowlands]

Dennis is now a productive member of society? Whoa.....   Miracles do happen.

[irishbobcat]

Shrimp, you and your neo-con buddies are no longer worthy of my time and energy.....
let's just agree to leave one another alone......
good-day.....

[Youngstownshrimp]

Dennis my Man!  What is your job and how are YOU productive in our society?  I'm going to try to get someone from Mexico to bid on your job?

[irishbobcat]

I work Shrimp....I have a job........

I am not an entitled one......the people you hate so much......

the people you disgard as non-humans.......


Pay your taxes..please, shrimp.........

[Youngstownshrimp]

In most countries Dennis is rich, yes I think we should make Dennis pay his fair share and work his entitled ass off for once.  Right now there is a Hindu or Asian more educated than Dennis and soon he or she will underbid Dennis for his Job or his entitled slot, we all know China is supporting Dennis and soon they will replace him for the truly poor.  And us makers will laugh our #@##@ off!    I grew up in a third world country, Dennis would be considered rich and living a life of liesure since he spends all his time on this forum.  Funny thing is Dennis sees nothing wrong with it, he truly is oblivious to all this.  Dennis, who do you think is telling us to slash wages, the Chinese, they know how lazy you are?

[Dan Moadus]

I just don't get it. I posted this video: http://tiny.cc/8b2fu  it shows (graphically) the impossibility, the absolute futility of trying to make the rich pay for this mess. Just take this years budget. If instead of just taxing the rich, and super rich we instead took ever penny they earned; in fact every penny of everybody who makes over $250,000 a year, then took every penny earned by every Fortune 500 company, we couldn't even fund the government through half the year.  Please, Dennis, if you even have a shred of sanity left, explain how taxing them more will achieve the goal, if taking every penny from them will not.

[sfc_oliver]

If we were to confiscate every Dime from the top 5% of Americans we still could not pay off the debt. We have to cut spending. Until the deficit is zero we are going the wrong direction.

[Rick Rowlands]

Just think.  From 1787 until 1913 nobody paid income taxes at all and this country grew and grew and grew...    Now we have high rates of taxation and we decline, decline, decline...

[irishbobcat]

Why We Must Raise Taxes on the Rich, ASAP!
America's wealthiest are paying a pittance in taxes, while the country is chipping away at its central foundations to meet budget shortfalls.
April 4, 2011  |       LIKE THIS ARTICLE ?
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         It's tax time. It's also a time when right-wing Republicans are setting the agenda for massive spending cuts that will hurt most Americans.

Here's the truth: The only way America can reduce the long-term budget deficit, maintain vital services, protect Social Security and Medicare, invest more in education and infrastructure, and not raise taxes on the working middle class is by raising taxes on the super rich.

Even if we got rid of corporate welfare subsidies for big oil, big agriculture, and big Pharma – even if we cut back on our bloated defense budget – it wouldn't be nearly enough.

The vast majority of Americans can't afford to pay more. Despite an economy that's twice as large as it was thirty years ago, the bottom 90 percent are still stuck in the mud. If they're employed they're earning on average only about $280 more a year than thirty years ago, adjusted for inflation. That's less than a 1 percent gain over more than a third of a century. (Families are doing somewhat better but that's only because so many families now have to rely on two incomes.)

Yet even as their share of the nation's total income has withered, the tax burden on the middle has grown. Today's working and middle-class taxpayers are shelling out a bigger chunk of income in payroll taxes, sales taxes, and property taxes than thirty years ago.

It's just the opposite for super rich.

The top 1 percent's share of national income has doubled over the past three decades (from 10 percent in 1981 to well over 20 percent now). The richest one-tenth of 1 percent's share has tripled. And they're doing better than ever. According to a new analysis by the Wall Street Journal, total compensation and benefits at publicly-traded Wall Street banks and securities firms hit a record in 2010 — $135 billion. That's up 5.7 percent from 2009.

Yet, remarkably, taxes on the top have plummeted. From the 1940s until 1980, the top tax income tax rate on the highest earners in America was at least 70 percent. In the 1950s, it was 91 percent. Now it's 35 percent. Even if you include deductions and credits, the rich are now paying a far lower share of their incomes in taxes than at any time since World War II.

The estate tax (which only hits the top 2 percent) has also been slashed. In 2000 it was 55 percent and kicked in after $1 million. Today it's 35 percent and kicks in at $5 million. Capital gains – comprising most of the income of the super-rich – were taxed at 35 percent in the late 1980s. They're now taxed at 15 percent.

If the rich were taxed at the same rates they were half a century ago, they'd be paying in over $350 billion more this year alone, which translates into trillions over the next decade. That's enough to accomplish everything the nation needs while also reducing future deficits.

If we also cut what we don't need (corporate welfare and bloated defense), taxes could be reduced for everyone earning under $80,000, too. And with a single payer health-care system – Medicare for all – instead of a gaggle of for-profit providers, the nation could save billions more.

Yes, the rich will find ways to avoid paying more taxes courtesy of clever accountants and tax attorneys. But this has always been the case regardless of where the tax rate is set. That's why the government should aim high. (During the 1950s, when the top rate was 91 percent, the rich exploited loopholes and deductions that as a practical matter reduced the effective top rate 50 to 60 percent – still substantial by today's standards.)