The tax system needs an overhaul.
Instead of blaming the wealthy for taking advantage of every legal method of paying less tax, perhaps the blame should go to the lawmakers who created such a convoluted system.
Earn more money, pay a greater percent: from each according to his earnings? Sounds a little socialist, no?
I can think of nothing just in the government being entitled to more of my hard-earned money just because I earn more than somebody else.
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11 comments:
Does this post need an overhaul? I am confused, what does it say?
Julie,
They are talking about the extremely wealthy. You are of the middle class. Depending up your earnings, you'll pay up to 35% of your income in taxes. Perhaps more when state and local taxes are taken into account. The extremely wealthy may pay only 15% at most, maybe less depending upon tax breaks, or other dodges and likely they bought the best legislators money can buy. The wealthy paid more taxes under Eisenhower than they do today. The country is going broke. The government has to get the money from someone. You and I have little say or pull and we don't have an army of tax lawyers, accountants, and a corporation to hide behind to shield us from the IRS. So, be prepared to pay more. Some of that money has to go to veterans who nearly gave their lives for their country by the way and who need further care. Would you deny them by not paying your taxes when they've paid much more?
John
"Sounds a little socialist, no?"
You make it sound like a bad thing! I've been at the bottom, on food stamps and disability. Now I'm self-sufficient and things are looking more up. As I make more, I need less and can contribute more.
Certainly the code needs an overhaul, though. I'm intrigued by the "fair tax" proposal, which is not based on income.
But socialism as a bad word? Nope, not for me. Sometimes I wish I was a European.
John - So to some extent you assert that middle class folks are taxed but underrepresented. Where do you draw the line for "extremely wealthy"? That group comprises a certain percentage of the population and a certain percentage of taxes paid. What are the numbers?
By maxing out my 401(k) I can drop one or two brackets. And I still assert that the tax scale is unjust. Every bit harder that I work is a bit less effective in creating income for me. I intend to pay as little tax as I legally can.
Veterans, whales, starving children in Africa. Social security, medicare, welfare. There are programs set up in this country and they have to be funded somehow (or abolished). Who's funding the "economic stimulus" package? Taxpayers, duh. But how many actually understand that?
Jon - I can tell the word socialist caught your attention!
If individual States want to take a socialist approach to finances, that's fine. Same with socialized healthcare - I'd like to see California try it. Then you can go live in that state. Or Europe. I will assert that the US was never intended to be a socialist institution, and therefore should not become one. Not a question of good or bad but of straying from the original intent. We could argue that the US is headed toward a dictatorship or the rule of the elite, too - also not the original intent. Also bad!
Society used to take care of its own, and now, it seems, figures that "the government" will handle it. Kind of an interesting change in mindset.
I would prefer a method of individual taxation that favors no-one. (Exception for those hovering around the poverty line.) I haven't looked into the proposed flat-tax legislation specifics but I do like the idea.
The US wasn't originally intended to be free of slaves, either ... the argument of original intent doesn't impress me.
However I think we can agree that things can be improved. Fair tax, fixed percentage, who knows. But change is the only constant in Maya-land. Original intentions yield to present realities as all organisms develop.
The paragraph not constructing an argument: Intent was the simplest argument and the one least founded in my personal preference. I'm against socialism on a large scale because I don't think it would work; the layers of procedure and bureaucracy would become more cumbersome than they are presently. I favor small, local government, with increases in scale to cover issues that increase in magnitude. At the scale of a state, give socialism a shot. At a much smaller scale than that it might even fly. And at a smaller scale I might even go for it; in a small enough community there's accountability among members both for their contributions and for effective use of what's received. Diversifying resources also diversifies risks and benefits.
The paragraph constructing an argument, just because I think you're tossing the baby with the bathwater based on slavery: Original intent is a valid and supportable argument only if you agree to the base premises, one of which is that original intent is worth anything. (We deal with that question in my line of architecture all the time, and the answer isn't always yes.) The original intent (that I had in mind) is for a group of self-governing states to band together to promote their common good and welfare. I don't think one could successfully argue that supporting slavery was a central purpose of forming the U.S. Nor do I think that based on what might at best be a lousy secondary purpose, that the whole of original intent should be considered as worthless.
There's a big question to be asked about the extent to which a person would legislate morals. Furthermore, social or financial preferences. To some extent it touches on the extent to which one values free will. To some extent it questions whether or how the values of a society are expressed through its self-governance.
Um, so, back to work.
You're right, many, many factors are involved, many questions, many of which are not really quantifiable.
What it really comes down to is that everyone is doing what seems to be right and to make sense. Sometimes big government is good, sometimes bad... For instance, without a strong central gov't, I'm convinced blacks would still not have Civil Rights in Virginia, and I'm certain homosexuality would still be a felony as it was until a few years ago. On the other hand, I think that things like "No Child Left Behind" have been ultimately destructive, and smaller jurisdictions have far more wisdom in creating curricula in developing education.
But these are merely the particulars as seen through one set of eyes--big deal.
What I think more interesting is a larger picture, of how society has been changing throughout the ages. It seems to me that Spirit, through Its incarnations as people, is exploring all the possibilities--tribalism, feudalism, monarchy, dictatorship, democracy, capitalism, socialism and the rest, and the rate of change seems to be accelerating as Spirit tests one against the other, finding one less desirable than another, in this case or that.
The democracy that the founding fathers intended for white male landowners and merchants has morphed to something else. What we have now will also change.
This whole thing reminds me of Zen story that Trev posted a long time ago: here.
(I apologize for picking on you about "socialism" and "original intent"; here in the capital of the Religious Right, I've developed quite an allergy to the use of those and similar buzzwords, since in most contexts here, they're used simply to manipulate people through associations.)
"What it really comes down to is that everyone is doing what seems to be right and to make sense."
Good comment Jon. More later (I think). You'll probably enjoy this article: I read it yesterday but now realize it was published seven and a half years ago, so it might not be new to you. http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/7.01/amish.html
Ah, thanks, that WAS a good article, though a tad longer than I expected.
It reminded me of something from "The Ugly American" (which I regard as one of the most important books ever written) about how in the post-war era, the US would often introduce the latest and greatest technologies to countries where most of the people still lived in primitive conditions and the horse or water buffalo was considered the highest technology. It questioned the introduction of the automobile before the bicycle, and how such an unnatural evolution worsened the gap between rich and poor.
I also appreciated the brief mention of Messiah College. That's where I was baptized, when I went there to a Messianic Jewish Conference in 1980.
I'm sure that there's some bean counter in the IRS who has the numbers Julie. You were complaining about about your tax burden. I pointed out that the Middle Class and the Poor are likely to be paying more of that burden in the future because we don't have lobbyists and such looking out for our interests. If the government was looking out for our interests as it should be, would we be in the mess we are in today? Probably not. But who knows? I never expected us to use most of our armed forces fighting terrorists. I certainly didn't expect oil to triple in price, or another real estate meltdown like 1987. Good old Republicans.
I, as a European, truly wonder about what's going to happen next year. Obama, Hilary or Mccain ...
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