Because teh Taxes@! Teh Texas+@

Political "cowardice"? Huh?

Our elected leaders are doing exactly what they need to do to get themselves re-elected. The fault is our own, we keep electing them.

The cowards are the American people for bending over and taking it up the pooper from an ever more powerful cadre of financial elites and their stooges in politics.

I think one of the main problems is a single statistic that has been wildly misunderstood and distorted. That would be "the top X% of earners pay Y% of all taxes." First of all, I think arguing against a new tax should be based on how it's going to affect the people its taxing versus how it's going to affect the general population. The fact that the wealthy pay a high percentage of all tax revenue isn't a problem in itself- it's an intuitive irregularity.

But anyway, the reason the wealthy pay such a disproportionately high percentage of total federal tax revenue is because they have such a disproportionately high percentage of the country's money. Their share is so high because middle and lower class growth has stagnated while the highest few percent have thrived.

I agree that it is the typical cowardice of our political leaders, especially Democrats, that prevent us from simply raising taxes on the rich back up to where they ought to be. But unless and until we have public financing of elections, it is the rich and powerful who are providing all the campaign funds the politicians require for their re-elections and who they have oriented all their attention toward in the past 30-40 years.

Believe it or not I have seen CNN talking heads reflecting information that if one makes a certain amount the whole income is taxes at the top percentage.

Please the income scale that pays the per-cent tax on the left side so that the income amounts reflect the taxable percentage. Remember the highest income earners only pay the same tax as any other citizen in each beginning brackets. Also please remember that the richest individual may not be the highest income earners!

Also remember the largest amount of asset increase for the rich is reflected in increase value of a stock, business, land and structure, and other physical assets. These do not reflect in the yearly income figures and under Bush the “death tax” was decrease and for a short period stopped.

To all you John Galt wannabes out there please take note that the golden age in 20th century America was the 1950's and 1960's where Americans led the world in innovation, where the American workers were paid well, made products that the rest of the world wanted and the wealthy paid had an income tax rate in excess of 80%.

Everything was going well until you John Galt types out there started walking the Earth like Satan in Steven King's novel The Stand, misleading people with lies that hell is actually Utopia. "Just lower taxes...it is yours, you deserve it." There are lies and then there are damned lies.

Having lived in many different city and states I can say without a doubt that cities/ states with Wealthier industry or populous do enjoy better ,police service/ hospitals/ schools/ infrastucture. These wealthier areas I've lived in also have healthier , more capable employees and safer streets to conduct buisiness large and small in .Essentialy profit is in the people. transportation , health services and crime prevention services are neccesary for buisiness to function. At all . There is no profit without these things . Now If were going to argue the impropriety of unfair tax burdens than it is essential that we acknowledge the plight of the hourly worker and the fact that our minimum wage is criminaly low in this country . If you have ever had to live off of it then you would not question that. Also there are not nearly enough hours given and most hourly positions do not allow for overtime or cut it aggressively. Therefore the very health and survival of the American workforce is on a tightrope as it is . We no longer make enough to survive and retirement is getting harder to save for. We are also currently denied the right to organize. It is moot to argue the point that a healthy and educated workforce is neccesary to be profitable in the first place. So where do we go from here?The problem is that when we argue taxes we talk about fairness when the heart of the redistribution argument is sustainability and taken forward prosperity. I'm for prosperity over profit .

The US Navy patrols the middle east to protect the investments of American oil billionaires. They are actually deployed on oil platforms to guard them. My son just came back from from 7 months of doing just that. And he did not mention running into John Gault out there.

All of you suck-holes who want to know how the rich are making out in our "capitalist" system - ought to fucking enlist or STFU.

Raising the rates would not be enough. The very wealthiest taxpayers could avoid the tax simply by holding (and not selling) their appreciated securities and borrowing against the appreciation.

Only a mark-to-market tax on the publicly-traded securities of the highest-income and wealthiest individuals would achieve the progressivity you seek.

This proposal would raise significantly more revenue than the surtax, would be much more progressive, would not require any increase in tax rates, would affect far fewer taxpayers, and would be more in line with the consensus view that the tax base must be broadened. It would also level the playing field between wage and income earners (who are currently subject to tax at ordinary income rates on all or virtually all of their economic income) and with investors (who defer tax indefinitely on appreciation and, when taxed, pay it at reduced long-term capital gains rates).

See http://www.cadwalader.com/assets/article/120505MillerTaxNotes.pdf

http://govinfo.library.unt.edu/taxreformpanel/meetings/docs/miller_052005.ppt

The argument is valid BUT, we play the wrong game when we argue about the level of taxation separately from how that money is spent. The old Reaganaut cry of 'tax and spend' should be more specific. 'Tax who and spend on what?'
For example, rather than the overall cost of fixing health care being the focus; the central point should be how to get the population healthier and more prosperous. All expenditures in the open, including the several taxes, premiums, deductibles, copays, and opportunity costs, such as working like a 'benefit serf.' All benefits on the table, including decrease in car insurance, healthier workers, etc, etc.
All people in all countries complain about taxes. Most would pay more for a government that works and seems just.

pay for the Health Care Plan. This is just dumb. Why can't they just raise the top rate back to where it was in 1984? Look at where it was in the 1950's thought of as the golden age of American prosperity.(Chart above)
bags factory

So funcy to read the article in this blog. Thank you for posting it.
Marcadis & Associates

I am a fair citizen that pays all due fees toward the local administration. Yet, I get along better with private insurances. Car insurance Ireland or other service providers of that kind seem to be doing their job quite fast and with all due fairness as well.