O-Trap;1835266 wrote:Taxes themselves aren't even based on the amount of money controlled. They're based on the amount of money earned.

Top 10% (all people who earn over $150K) earn 43% of the income and pay 71% of the total taxes.

So whatever "money" they control as it pertains to taxable income is under 43% (since you're talking about, essentially, a fraction of the top 1% as opposed to the top 10%), and they already pay a disproportional percentage of the total tax revenue.

This is, of course, assuming you can demonstrate even the claim you did make (which wasn't related to my point) that they "control 80% of the money," anyway.

My structure allows for greater upward mobility while making those who enjoy the protections of the United States pay their "fair share". I agree that finding out exactly what is a "fair share", but quibbling over a few percentage points to figure that out isn't worth it.

My structure is fair because once you are making $1M a year you have enough money to take care of your needs and wants while paying for the country that allows you to cover both.

jmog;1835277 wrote:Those making over 1M do not make 80% of the income, so therefore they do not "control" 80% either.

Hope this helps.

Sure, let me shed tears for those making over $1M a year.

sleeper;1835280 wrote:Sure, let me shed tears for those making over $1M a year.

Probably better to shed tears for your lack of skillz.

sleeper;1835280 wrote:Sure, let me shed tears for those making over $1M a year.

Fake tears, ala Chuck U Schumer ?

like_that;1835274 wrote:How do you all feel about a flat tax? The pros outweigh the cons imo and it incentives people to work harder to make more money.

Isn't this what Hong Kong does? They've been #1 on the economic freedom index for years.

sleeper;1835280 wrote:Sure, let me shed tears for those making over $1M a year.

Typical, get proven wrong, change the subject.

sleeper;1835279 wrote:My structure allows for greater upward mobility

Proof?

sleeper;1835279 wrote:while making those who enjoy the protections of the United States pay their "fair share".

Restating it as a fact claim doesn't make it any more or less true. I've still not heard it substantiated as fair. As such, your system might be rather unfair.

sleeper;1835279 wrote:I agree that finding out exactly what is a "fair share", but quibbling over a few percentage points to figure that out isn't worth it.

How do you know we're talking about just a few percentage points? Where's the data? I cited stats above. I'd love to see yours teased out.

sleeper;1835279 wrote:My structure is fair because once you are making $1M a year you have enough money to take care of your needs and wants while paying for the country that allows you to cover both.

Again, this is subjective. Why not $900,000? Are they not able to do the same with 20% of that income? Or why not 70% instead of 80%?

You've still not cited anything to establish it as fair other than subjective opinion.

O-Trap;1835395 wrote:You've still not cited anything to establish it as fair other than subjective opinion.

Well, when you've decided your New Year's Resolution is to play the role of LEFT-WING QUAKER, there's not going to be much more than subjective opinions behind your views. Whether they be your own subjective opinions or those of others regurgitated as your "links of the day".

The only true "fair share" is that a person is entitled to the fruits of his labor. If you don't work, then you must subsist on charity. What this discussion is about is how much the government should/can forcibly extract from productive people to support the non productive.

Heretic;1835397 wrote:Well, when you've decided your New Year's Resolution is to play the role of LEFT-WING QUAKER, there's not going to be much more than subjective opinions behind your views. Whether they be your own subjective opinions or those of others regurgitated as your "links of the day".

I totally see this. Like, I know what's happening.

And I just can't stop. It's almost fun.

HitsRus;1835405 wrote:The only true "fair share" is that a person is entitled to the fruits of his labor. If you don't work, then you must subsist on charity. What this discussion is about is how much the government should/can forcibly extract from productive people to support the non productive.

Charity is a good thing, and I think there is a duty as a human to help those in your circle who genuinely need it or help organizations to do so, if you don't know anyone personally.

I agree with your sentiment currently. I've just heard it often enough that I want to know whether or not there is anything substantial behind the term.

O-Trap;1835416 wrote:I've just heard it often enough that I want to know whether or not there is anything substantial behind the term.

No. It's just a term that people use as a weapon.

O-Trap;1835395 wrote:Proof?



Restating it as a fact claim doesn't make it any more or less true. I've still not heard it substantiated as fair. As such, your system might be rather unfair.



How do you know we're talking about just a few percentage points? Where's the data? I cited stats above. I'd love to see yours teased out.



Again, this is subjective. Why not $900,000? Are they not able to do the same with 20% of that income? Or why not 70% instead of 80%?

You've still not cited anything to establish it as fair other than subjective opinion.

Why have tax rates at all since we don't know why we have the current brackets?

I'm more concerned about taking care of our poorest citizens and having the rich, who enjoy the US to the fullest, pay their fair share. I guess that's just me though, caring about poor people who can barely feed their families rather than the Millionaires and Billionaires that eat lobster every night.

Don't like 80%? Cut the Defense Budget in half tomorrow and we will lower it to 60%.

lol

sleeper;1835436 wrote:Why have tax rates at all since we don't know why we have the current brackets?

I would actually pose that same question. The current system already seems disproportionate to income rates. I'm certainly not advocating for the current system. But I suppose I can then posit why the current system isn't already having the wealthy (top 10% getting 43% of the income and paying over 70% of the taxes) pay their fair share? What is the logic that says this is unfair, but that your proposal would be fair?

sleeper;1835436 wrote:I'm more concerned about taking care of our poorest citizens and having the rich, who enjoy the US to the fullest, pay their fair share.

Again, using the term in this way is, at most, cyclical reasoning.

I agree with taking care of people who are incapable of taking care of their needs. That doesn't mean I agree with paying for the infrastructure to oversee it subjectively.

sleeper;1835436 wrote:I guess that's just me though, caring about poor people who can barely feed their families rather than the Millionaires and Billionaires that eat lobster every night.

And of course multiple government bureaucracies, all of which require funds for infrastructure and pay for the number of employees in each, is the most efficient way to do this, yes?

sleeper;1835436 wrote:Don't like 80%? Cut the Defense Budget in half tomorrow and we will lower it to 60%.

I'd be on board with cutting the defense budget, but you still haven't established any tangible evidence as to why 60%, 80%, 90%, etc. is "fair."

[INDENT]I'd be on board with cutting the defense budget, but you still haven't established any tangible evidence as to why 60%, 80%, 90%, etc. is "fair."[/INDENT]


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Simple. Whatever tax rate is necessary to pay for our government without making poor people chose between taxes or eating food. You do the math and you get 80%.

sleeper;1835455 wrote:Simple. Whatever tax rate is necessary to pay for our government without making poor people chose between taxes or eating food. You do the math and you get 80%.

Okay. Just a couple followup questions to this:

1. Where is this math?

2. What makes that "fair?" Naturally, if we were incapable of deficit spending, I could see it being called "necessary," but even if that were the case (and it's obviously not), what makes it more than "necessary?" What makes it "fair?"

O-Trap;1835468 wrote:Okay. Just a couple followup questions to this:

1. Where is this math?

2. What makes that "fair?" Naturally, if we were incapable of deficit spending, I could see it being called "necessary," but even if that were the case (and it's obviously not), what makes it more than "necessary?" What makes it "fair?"

1. I'm not going to do your work for you. I've done the math, rich people can afford it
2. Fairness is simple. Can both the rich and poor feed their families? If yes, taxes are fine. If no, raise the tax of the group that CAN afford to feed their families until the answer to the question is yes.

Simple.

sleeper;1835470 wrote:1. I'm not going to do your work for you. I've done the math, rich people can afford it
2. Fairness is simple. Can both the rich and poor feed their families? If yes, taxes are fine. If no, raise the tax of the group that CAN afford to feed their families until the answer to the question is yes.

Simple.

1. My question isn't now, nor has it ever been, whether or not people can afford it. My request was for the math that showed it to be fair, not possible.
2. Again, you appear to be mistaking "possible" with "fair." It's possible that women get paid 80% of what men get paid for the same jobs. It's not fair, but it's possible.

I'm not sure if you don't understand the question or have no good answer for it, but if this will help, try it:

When you answer, ask yourself if you're addressing whether or not something is possible. If you are, then you're not addressing whether or not it is fair. There are things that would be fair, but aren't possible. There are things that are possible, but not fair. In order for two things to be the same, every attribute or example of them must be the same, per the law of identity.

So, once again, I'm not asking whether or not it's possible for everyone to survive under your model (assuming that doesn't become the tipping point for a fair number of millionaires to expatriate), because whether or not it's possible doesn't even address whether or not it's fair.

It is obvious Sleeper is out of his intellectual league in this thread.

Of course when you are just trolling, it is hard to seem like you have any intelligence whatsoever.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N920A using Tapatalk

The hodge podge that is the internal revenue code is already essentially a consumption tax for the middle class because any tax system that does not tax additions to savings is a consumption tax. The easier thing to do than a VAT is to simply eliminate all taxes on capital income and change the rules on how the use of debt proceeds are taxed (this would be possible if we defined the internal revenue code as a tax targeting discretionary consumption v. income and avoid court precedent).

A progressive tax that reaches discretionary, conspicuous and gluttonous consumption at higher rates is the best possible tax system IMHO. The problem is that people would still think of it as a tax on the income of the very rich when really it taxes what they take out of the economy rather than what they put in....under this system Bill Gates and Warren Buffet and Elon Musk who use their wealth in positive ways and don't consume much are taxed less than Kim Kardashian and Donald Trump who use their wealth for gluttonous consumption. 

Fairness is what we would bargain for under a "veil of ignorance" from the "Original Position" not knowing who we are and what our standing would be in American Society and having all relevant and material facts to inform the bargaining process - e.g. stats regarding social mobility, what sort of tax system would be the best to support the "fair" system of resource acquisition and allocation while promoting rising prosperity etc.

HitsRus;1835405 wrote:The only true "fair share" is that a person is entitled to the fruits of his labor. If you don't work, then you must subsist on charity. What this discussion is about is how much the government should/can forcibly extract from productive people to support the non productive.

This can be easily solved. 1. the internal revenue code is a consumption tax for the middle class - make it so for all business and individuals by exempting all capital expenditures and additions to saving from taxation and only when the proceeds are used for or borrowed against for discretionary, gluttonous or conspicuous consumption is it subject to taxation at a progressive rate structure.

So if you earn $1 million per year and you are a mizer and you consume $50,000 while saving the rest, you incur little tax if any. If you consume $1 million and save or invest $0, high rates of taxation on said consumption even in excess of 50% are not as morally dubious under the fruits of labor theory because what is being taxed is the extreme excess you take out of the economy (with dubious marginal utility) and not what you put in.


Moreover, replace current welfare state with a "Job Guarantee" wherein the Fed's provide accounts to the State government's who then block grant funds to productive non-profits/charities/faith-based organizations - maybe you could even include small for-profit firms - empowering the free enterprise system with the funds to absorb the entire potential supply of labor and correcting the primary failure of market economies wherein the supply of labor is almost always out of equilibrium with the demand for labor thus giving rise to anti-capitalist movements like Marxism.

like_that;1835274 wrote:How do you all feel about a flat tax? The pros outweigh the cons imo and it incentives people to work harder to make more money.

A flat tax on income from any source derived is not optimal for a couple reasons. 1. It will increase the rate of taxation of savings and capital investment of the middle class in comparison to the current hodge podge internal revenue code which effectively exempts middle class additions to savings. For this reason, a flat tax would increase disincentives to saving and working for the middle class.

What current discussion misses I think is that people are very concerned about the TAX RATE when they should be concerned about the TAX BASE. For the rich in America, they have an income tax that reaches both their savings and consumption. We should have a tax system that is not neutral with regard to the source of income and level of consumption.

IMHO, it is preferable to eliminate all taxes on capital income and vastly increase the marginal tax rate on high levels of conspicuous of consumption. It will be a tough sell though because Conservatives will think of it as a tax increase on the income of the rich and liberals will think that it is a give away to the rich because it eliminates capital gains taxes.

The political messaging would be very hard but a progressive consumption tax that exempts non-discretionary consumption (or some approximation thereof e.g. through a universal standard-type deduction) and contains marginal tax rates on obscene Kardashian and Trump levels of consumption even above 50% can cohere the sort of enlightened capitalism that Adam Smith envisioned.

ernest_t_bass;1835349 wrote:Isn't this what Hong Kong does? They've been #1 on the economic freedom index for years.

Exactly opposite. They do have a low flat rate on personal labor income but they have no taxes on capital income and that is the key. Moreover it is not a flat rate truly on person income because you can take deductions.

Also, they finance a single-payer healthcare system and they are able to have low taxe rates and do so because they get most of their government revenue by selling land from the land bank. If Americans were more enlightened we could reduce our taxation here to Hong Kong levels if folks would see that the U.S. Selling assets to the private economy in the form of Treasuries is no different than Hong Kong selling land. But "ZOMG teh National DEBT!" and all that.

queencitybuckeye;1835169 wrote:What's a fair amount of coercion? Zero, with the understanding that it's not achievable if one wants a somewhat stable society.

If it is coercion the theory of popular sovereignty is not wholly legitimate and the founders were wrong. I do think it would be philosophically just if the Congress did more ritualistic things for individual citizens to give their consent to the government and allow easier emigration, etc.