The rich pay their "fair share"...

[Seth]

...and then some...

Do the Wealthy Really Pay Their ‘Fair Share’? Economics Professor Breaks It All Down
Feb. 16, 2015 4:12pm Billy Hallowell
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Do the rich pay their fair share of taxes? That’s the very question that Lee Ohanian, an economics professor at UCLA, tackled in a new course for Prager University, revealing some fascinating statistics that he says dispel the myth that the wealthy aren’t paying enough into the tax system.

Ohanian began by noting that defining two elements is essential before fully understanding the issue: who, exactly, qualifies as rich and how “fair” should be defined.

“According to 2011 data, a top 10 percent house makes around $150,000 per year in gross annual income [before deductions and taxes],” he said, noting that the top five percent consists of people making $190,00 and above.

Ohanian said the top one percent consists of people making $500,000, and above and that the proportion of those who make millions and billions is actually “very small.”
Prager University

Prager University

Then, the professor defined what he believes is “fair” when it comes to taxation.

“Fair would seem to be that the group of taxpayers who earn 10 percent of the country’s income would pay 10 percent of the country’s taxes,” he said, noting that this doesn’t end up happening in practice. “According to IRS data, the top 10 percent of all earners pay 71 percent of all federal income tax, while earning only 43 percent of all income.”

Even the top one percent, he said, pays 37 percent of all federal income tax, while only earning 17 percent of it.

His conclusion: “If anything, the top 10 percent pay more than their fair share.”

Ohanian also dove into the payroll tax as well, which deducts money for Social Security and Medicare, arriving at similar conclusions.

“To say the rich, however you might define them, don’t pay their fair share is simply wrong,” he concluded.

[pErvinalia]

“Fair would seem to be that the group of taxpayers who earn 10 percent of the country’s income would pay 10 percent of the country’s taxes,” he said,

.....

His conclusion: “If anything, the top 10 percent pay more than their fair share.”

What a retarded argument! Arbitrarily define "fair" as something with a nice bit of symmetry about it, and then declare that the system is unfair as it doesn't meet his idiotic arbitrary definition.

The primary thing that needs to be achieved by any taxation system is paying the bills. That is, earning enough revenue to cover expenses. Virtually no government does that these days, and the simple reason is that taxes have been slashed under the neoliberal paradigm over the last 35 years. It's what's called a "structural deficit". That is, the very structure of your system is causing the deficit. Which adds to the reasons why I hate people who want to blame the poor for the states of our economies. We need to lose this neoliberal idea that pampering the rich is the way to best grow an economy. Actually, that's not the actual idea in play here, it's just the stated reason. The actual idea in play is oligarchic cronyism. The system is run by people who are looking out for themselves, not the vast majority. If we want to maximise growth (which I personally don't want to see, as that is what is driving us towards the ecological cliff), then we need to reduce the inequality that neoliberalism causes.

[Rum]

The poor pay more as a percentage of their income.


http://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/j ... x-research

[PsychoSerenity]

That "economics professor" is either a complete moron or is intentionally trying to mislead people in a way so over the top that only the ignorant could fall for it.

Even UKIP ditched their plans for a flat rate tax as soon as someone pointed out to them what their back-of-a-fag-packet idea would mean.

First of all if your income tax rates are entirely proportional then when you add in all other sorts of taxes the overall tax system is regressive, meaning the poor pay a higher effective rate of tax than the wealthy. Secondly even if you had such a progressive income tax that the overall tax system was approximately flat (which as Rum points out we still don't), then you would have a tax system that overall did absolutely nothing to work against the various inequalities and injustices in society.

[Seth]

“Fair would seem to be that the group of taxpayers who earn 10 percent of the country’s income would pay 10 percent of the country’s taxes,” he said,

.....

His conclusion: “If anything, the top 10 percent pay more than their fair share.”

What a retarded argument! Arbitrarily define "fair" as something with a nice bit of symmetry about it, and then declare that the system is unfair as it doesn't meet his idiotic arbitrary definition.

Yeah, that's Marxist "fairness" for you...it means whatever Marxists want it to mean in achieving their class warfare agenda.

The primary thing that needs to be achieved by any taxation system is paying the bills.

Actually, the way it should work is that government only spends what it already has in the bank, just like everyone else does.

That is, earning enough revenue to cover expenses. Virtually no government does that these days, and the simple reason is that taxes have been slashed under the neoliberal paradigm over the last 35 years.

Actually it's spending that has increased beyond the economy's ability to pay for it.

It's what's called a "structural deficit". That is, the very structure of your system is causing the deficit.

Right. So the government should stop spending money it doesn't have.

Which adds to the reasons why I hate people who want to blame the poor for the states of our economies.

Oh, the dependent class should get its share of the blame. For example:

"Our greatest primary task is to put people to work." - Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1933.

Although sometimes considered the father of the American entitlement state, FDR understood that our sense of achievement and self-sufficiency comes from our work.

Forty years later, another Democrat, Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan likewise grasped the degrading affect of welfare on those it supposedly benefits: "It cannot too often be stated that the issue of welfare is not what it costs those who provide it, but what it costs those who receive it."

In the past 50 years, our federal government has made it increasingly easy to collect a check for doing nothing. We are now witnessing the rotting fruits of those policies falling from the tree of good intentions and spoiling our society from within.

FDR's "make work" programs paid people to put their abilities to work:

- Civilian Conservation Corps employed two million unmarried men under military-style discipline to work on reservoirs, bridges and forests.

- Civil Works Administration put four million men to work performing tasks from tutoring to building schools and public parks.

- Works Progress Administration employed some nine million Americans, mostly working on roads and bridges but also artistic projects.

Today, we seek workers from other countries to perform "jobs Americans won't do." Americans won't do those jobs because they're too comfortable sitting on their couch while collecting a handout.

Employers must compete against the wages government pays for doing nothing and the reality that working for a living means forfeiting 40 hours of leisure time each week.

Since 1964 when President Johnson declared "War on Poverty," the percentage of men ages 25-34 who neither work nor seek work has more than tripled, from 3 percent to 11 percent, writes Nicholas Eberstadt in National Affairs. Among men ages 45-54, the share that has left the work force soared from just under 5 percent to almost 15 percent.

"American men in the prime of life have never been healthier," Eberstadt writes. "Yet they are less committed to working ... than at any point in our nation's history."

In just the past 30 years, the share of Americans receiving means-tested welfare nearly doubled from 18.8 percent of the total population to 35.4 percent - rising from 42 million to 109 million people. That's more than twice as many as receive Social Security or Medicare benefits.

In both 1983 and 2012 - both years in which the country was recovering from severe recession - the poverty rate stood at 15 percent. That means that today the number of people above the poverty line receiving "need-based" payments is greater than those below the poverty line.

From 1963 to 2013, government welfare payments represented the fastest growing source of personal income in America.

"America today is almost certainly the richest society in history," Eberstadt writes. "Yet, paradoxically, our entitlement state behaves as if Americans have never been more 'needy.'"

"The fact that so many are willing to accept need-based aid signals a fundamental change in the American character."

Many Americans no longer feel any embarrassment about long-term reliance on government handouts. Government aids this appeasement by laundering money so recipients never bother to realize that real working men and women are paying for their life of leisure.

Americans are indeed generous and caring, but the distinction between the "deserving" and "undeserving" poor is being erased.

Ironically, anti-poverty programs have created a permanently-dependent underclass and a "poverty industry" both inside and outside of government.

Government is robbing our children of the values, culture and opportunity that made our country exceptional. Europe's experience bears witness that once the welfare state is grafted into our culture and economy, turning back the clock is virtually impossible.

Trading the Land of Opportunity for a government handout is the ultimate betrayal of those who built this country and those who now may never experience it.

Mark Hillman served as state treasurer and senate majority leader. To read more or comment, go to http://www.MarkHillman.com

We need to lose this neoliberal idea that pampering the rich is the way to best grow an economy.

Nobody's "pampering" the rich. The whole point of the article is to illustrate the fact that "the rich" pay the lion's share of government revenues, disproportionately so.

Actually, that's not the actual idea in play here, it's just the stated reason. The actual idea in play is oligarchic cronyism. The system is run by people who are looking out for themselves, not the vast majority. If we want to maximise growth (which I personally don't want to see, as that is what is driving us towards the ecological cliff), then we need to reduce the inequality that neoliberalism causes.

What a bunch of Marxist class-warfare tripe.

What percentage of the national revenues should "the rich" pay, in your opinion? And why?

[Seth]

The poor pay more as a percentage of their income.


http://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/j ... x-research

So what? They consume public resources to a greater extent than the wealthy do...far more in fact. Last I heard the typical total dollar-value gain of being on public assistance pays better than working.

The value of the full package of welfare benefits for a typical recipient in each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia exceeds the poverty level. Because welfare benefits are tax-free, their dollar value is often greater than the amount of take-home income a worker would have left after paying taxes on an equivalent pretax income.

[pErvinalia]

Actually, that's not the actual idea in play here, it's just the stated reason. The actual idea in play is oligarchic cronyism. The system is run by people who are looking out for themselves, not the vast majority. If we want to maximise growth (which I personally don't want to see, as that is what is driving us towards the ecological cliff), then we need to reduce the inequality that neoliberalism causes.

What a bunch of Marxist class-warfare tripe.

As usual, you don't have the first clue of what you are talking about. You've got a set of beliefs that you've never cared to test against reality. http://www.theguardian.com/business/201 ... ecd-report . I await your claim that the mathematical statistical analyses were created by Marxist mathematicians in the 19th century.

What percentage of the national revenues should "the rich" pay, in your opinion? And why?

The rich should pay the deficit in revenue minus spending after the poorer have paid an amount that doesn't leave them on the very brink of destitution. At the moment, the poorer in society are really on the brink, and there is a large structural deficit that isn't being paid for. Cutting wasteful services is fine, but cutting services which provide a positive social and/or economic benefit is stupid and is ideologically neoliberal.

[JimC]

What is mostly being avoided is not personal income tax on the wealthy, but taxation of global corporations. By employing battalions of tax lawyers, and shuttling assets around in a banking system eager to oblige them, many can get away with paying virtually no tax at all, while still benefiting from infrastructure provided by governments.

[Seth]

Actually, that's not the actual idea in play here, it's just the stated reason. The actual idea in play is oligarchic cronyism. The system is run by people who are looking out for themselves, not the vast majority. If we want to maximise growth (which I personally don't want to see, as that is what is driving us towards the ecological cliff), then we need to reduce the inequality that neoliberalism causes.

What a bunch of Marxist class-warfare tripe.

As usual, you don't have the first clue of what you are talking about. You've got a set of beliefs that you've never cared to test against reality. http://www.theguardian.com/business/201 ... ecd-report . I await your claim that the mathematical statistical analyses were created by Marxist mathematicians in the 19th century.

The fault in the report is the presumption that income inequality is inherently wrong even if it causes the economy to not perform at its maximum theoretical efficiency. "Income inequality" is merely a Marxist class-warfare bit of doublespeak intended to demonize those who are successful by implying that their wealth is stolen from the less wealthy as part of a bullshit zero-sum Marxist fallacy.

The false presumption that income inequality negatively affects GDP and that therefore the solution is to steal from the rich to give to the poor is classic Marxist misdirection and mendacity.

It is not true that an economy is a zero-sum game in which the wealthy get rich by stealing from the less wealthy or the poor. One's individual wealth is the result of many factors, but most importantly one's willingness to do the hard work required to be financially successful. As I pointed out earlier, as much as 11 to 15 percent of working-age males simply choose not to work because it's more profitable to take government welfare. Every dollar they get in welfare was taken from someone else, usually against their will, which is theft. And since those welfare leeches produce no wealth because they input no labor, their recycling of that which was stolen from someone else provides no net benefit to the economy. Every dime they spend is not spent by the person who actually did create wealth, only to have it taken from him involuntarily to support layabouts and thieves.

In addition, income inequality is what drives people to do better, invent new things and become economically successful. They see that it is possible for them to flourish in the US, and that there are no systematic barriers that prevent them from inventing and profiting from a better mousetrap, and they want to improve their economic position for themselves and their children.

If everybody has the same as everybody else, and hard work brings no added benefits to the worker, workers will only do that amount of labor minimally necessary to get what the government chooses to hand out. Doing more work than that is a complete waste of time, effort and energy, so people will stop creating wealth, which is the value of their labor added to something that can be sold at a profit.

The stupid notion that taking money from the wealthy and giving it to others in order to "equalize" income does nothing but disincentivize those who are members of the productive class and cause them to a) move their assets away from Socialist taxation; and b) stop working so hard, which is killing the goose that lays the golden egg the government needs to buy off the proletarian sloths so they won't string the Marxist elite up on a convenient lamppost.

What percentage of the national revenues should "the rich" pay, in your opinion? And why?

The rich should pay the deficit in revenue minus spending after the poorer have paid an amount that doesn't leave them on the very brink of destitution. At the moment, the poorer in society are really on the brink, and there is a large structural deficit that isn't being paid for. Cutting wasteful services is fine, but cutting services which provide a positive social and/or economic benefit is stupid and is ideologically neoliberal.

And why should the rich do so? Or continue to do so in the future? If you tax my wealth to pay off the deficit I'm not going to bother earning as much in the future. In fact, I'm going to liquidate my investments, remove all of my investment capital from the market, and I'm going to stop producing ANYTHING, stop generating ANY income at all, and stop paying ANY income taxes as I sit on my bags of gold enjoying all the luxuries I can afford for as long as your asinine regime lasts. And as soon as it's kicked out because people are starving because your tax policies can't force me to invest my money and make a profit you can tax, I'm going to go right back to good old capitalism, which is the ONLY way the economically dependent are going to remain fed.

Even if you simply confiscate outright all of the "excess wealth" you think needs redistribution, the effect of doing so will last about a month's worth of federal spending, and then there will be no golden goose at all to raid to pay the dependent class to keep them from rioting, and they will riot and YOU will find your head on a spike somewhere for fucking about with the economic SYSTEM that depends on constant flows of investment capital to keep things running.

The "wealthy" people of the world can bring your Marxist utopia to its knees literally overnight simply by refusing to spend or invest their money on wealth-production.

That's exactly what happened when the feds bailed out the big banks after the housing collapse. The banks didn't put that money back into circulation, they stuck it in an account and sat on it, and so did most major industrial players. They are still sitting on trillions of dollars waiting for Obama to drop dead and Biden to get shot by a jealous husband for groping his wife so they can go back to investing with a promise of profit.

The government can never tax enough to keep an economy running if those who have the capital simply sit on it and wait out the Marxist pretensions of economic legitimacy. And "nationalizing" doesn't work either, just ask Venezuela. You can nationalize infrastructure, but you can't nationalize the employees that are critical to running it, so when the oil companies were "nationalized" they just pulled everybody out and Venezuela was left with infrastructure it couldn't operate and a market that boycotted them for the egregious theft they perpetrated on the companies who invested billions in building that infrastructure.

The same thing happens every time some Marxist fuck decides "the people" ought to own everything...that the people didn't pay to create.

[piscator]

It's not that it's "Inherently wrong" to be rich Seth, it's just a lot easier for me to make $1 than it is for you to make $1, and it would weaken your dollar and mine if the tax codes don't reflect that.

[Seth]

It's not that it's "Inherently wrong" to be rich Seth, it's just a lot easier for me to make $1 than it is for you to make $1, and it would weaken your dollar and mine if the tax codes don't reflect that.

So what? Who told you that life is fair and that I'm entitled to make a dollar as easily as you make a dollar? If I want to make dollars as easily as you do, then I'll go back to college and get a degree in surveying and spend a bunch of years establishing myself as a competent surveyor, at which point I can demand higher rates of compensation for my input of labor in pursuit of profit.

Tax codes are supposed to fund necessary government services, not be used as instruments of social change. It's far too easy for such laws to be abused by partisans on one side or another when the goal is social engineering. Just look at the deliberate and entirely unlawful use of the IRS as an instrument of harassment against a particular political segment of society.

Sure, you probably think it's just fine that the IRS targeted Tea Party types, but don't be so stupid to think that it can't happen to you. If it can happen to them, it can happen to you, and it shouldn't be happening to anybody.

[piscator]

"So what?" I want my goddamn dollar to be as valuable as possible, that's what.
The rest of your narcissistic rant about what tax codes "Are supposed to" do is merely a statement of your arbitrary preferences. Whoopiefkndoo. We all got preferences.

[pErvinalia]

What is mostly being avoided is not personal income tax on the wealthy, but taxation of global corporations. By employing battalions of tax lawyers, and shuttling assets around in a banking system eager to oblige them, many can get away with paying virtually no tax at all, while still benefiting from infrastructure provided by governments.

Yeah, that's true. There's a couple of trillion weaseled away in tax havens worldwide. 30% of that would pay off a nice bit of debt.

[pErvinalia]

Actually, that's not the actual idea in play here, it's just the stated reason. The actual idea in play is oligarchic cronyism. The system is run by people who are looking out for themselves, not the vast majority. If we want to maximise growth (which I personally don't want to see, as that is what is driving us towards the ecological cliff), then we need to reduce the inequality that neoliberalism causes.

What a bunch of Marxist class-warfare tripe.

As usual, you don't have the first clue of what you are talking about. You've got a set of beliefs that you've never cared to test against reality. http://www.theguardian.com/business/201 ... ecd-report . I await your claim that the mathematical statistical analyses were created by Marxist mathematicians in the 19th century.

The fault in the report is the presumption that income inequality is inherently wrong even if it causes the economy to not perform at its maximum theoretical efficiency. "Income inequality" is merely a Marxist class-warfare bit of doublespeak intended to demonize those who are successful by implying that their wealth is stolen from the less wealthy as part of a bullshit zero-sum Marxist fallacy.

The false presumption that income inequality negatively affects GDP and that therefore the solution is to steal from the rich to give to the poor is classic Marxist misdirection and mendacity.

Huh?!? "inequality" is a concept that predated Marxism. The analysis clearly shows that as inequality increases the efficiency of the economy decreases. You claimed it didn't, and as usual, you are wrong.

It is not true that an economy is a zero-sum game in which the wealthy get rich by stealing from the less wealthy or the poor.

Strawman. The report doesn't say it is a zero-sum game. These guys are economists. They know very well that wealth isn't a zero-sum game. Stop obfuscating and face the facts.

As I pointed out earlier, as much as 11 to 15 percent of working-age males simply choose not to work because it's more profitable to take government welfare.

Bullshit. I've repudiated this nonsense before. Stop trolling. There are more job seekers than job vacancies. I think in the US it's about 2:1. In Australia it's more like 4:1.

Every dollar they get in welfare was taken from someone else, usually against their will, which is theft. And since those welfare leeches produce no wealth because they input no labor, their recycling of that which was stolen from someone else provides no net benefit to the economy.

The report directly repudiates this. On net, reducing inequality (via progressive taxation, for example) creates MORE benefit to the economy.

In addition, income inequality is what drives people to do better, invent new things and become economically successful. They see that it is possible for them to flourish in the US, and that there are no systematic barriers that prevent them from inventing and profiting from a better mousetrap, and they want to improve their economic position for themselves and their children.

Usual conservative false dichotomy. It's not a case of what we have now, or no inequality. These types of analyses don't talk about zero inequality. They simply talk about less than the extreme amount we have now.

If everybody has the same as everybody else,

Strawman.

The stupid notion that taking money from the wealthy and giving it to others in order to "equalize" income does nothing but disincentivize those who are members of the productive class and cause them to a) move their assets away from Socialist taxation; and b) stop working so hard, which is killing the goose that lays the golden egg the government needs to buy off the proletarian sloths so they won't string the Marxist elite up on a convenient lamppost.

Except, the economic analysis doesn't support your blinkered beliefs.

What percentage of the national revenues should "the rich" pay, in your opinion? And why?

The rich should pay the deficit in revenue minus spending after the poorer have paid an amount that doesn't leave them on the very brink of destitution. At the moment, the poorer in society are really on the brink, and there is a large structural deficit that isn't being paid for. Cutting wasteful services is fine, but cutting services which provide a positive social and/or economic benefit is stupid and is ideologically neoliberal.

And why should the rich do so? Or continue to do so in the future?

Because societies will fail if they don't roughly balance their budgets. The purpose of government and its functions is the management of society. If society goes broke and fails because they don't set appropriate levels of taxation, then they are defeating the purpose of governance. And looking at it from solely a rich person's perspective, without the protection and nourishment by society, they would no longer be able to make money, and likely wouldn't be able to keep what they have from the teeming dystopian masses.

If you tax my wealth to pay off the deficit I'm not going to bother earning as much in the future.

Yawn. This is the stupid Laffer curve fallacy. I've dealt with this before.

In fact, I'm going to liquidate my investments, remove all of my investment capital from the market, and I'm going to stop producing ANYTHING, stop generating ANY income at all, and stop paying ANY income taxes as I sit on my bags of gold enjoying all the luxuries I can afford for as long as your asinine regime lasts.

You might, because you've got a totally one-track mind. I've told you before about the psychological experiments that disprove the notion that money is the major incentive for humans. As with the Laffer shit, I've dealt with this before.

The "wealthy" people of the world can bring your Marxist utopia to its knees literally overnight simply by refusing to spend or invest their money on wealth-production.

You really are an idiot. Balancing the budget isn't "Marxist". It's fucking capitalism 101. You need to hypno-therapy or something to deal with your insane fear of Marxist boogy-men.

The government can never tax enough to keep an economy running if those who have the capital simply sit on it and wait out the Marxist pretensions of economic legitimacy.

Except that's not what happens. Norway et al are doing fine. In fact, their economies are infinitely stronger than the US's.

The same thing happens every time some Marxist fuck decides "the people" ought to own everything...that the people didn't pay to create.

Marxism, Marxism, Marxism.... You are one giant fruitcake.

[pErvinalia]

Tax codes are supposed to fund necessary government services, not be used as instruments of social change.

Governments are there for the management of society. Levying taxes is part of that process. Seriously, why do you not move to Somalia or some other third world shithole where the government isn't in the business of managing society? Stop fucking whinging about civilisation. If you hate civilisation so much, go and live in an Indian slum.