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Census finds record gap between rich and poor

CriticalThought said:
No, I explained exactly what you wanted, but you refused to hear it.

But if you need me to be more specfiic I will.

Joe Smith needs a job. Joe is qualified to work in manufacturing but Joe's job was shipped overseas to China and the cost to ship the manufacturing equipment there and invest in a new plant was paid for by a tax cut. The company that outsourced his job will save a ton of money on labor because it can higher 10 Chinamen for what they were paying Joe. His job probably would not have been lost had the policy been for the business to write off its capital investments in America instead of being given a tax cut which they could use to invest overseas.
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Yea, the company would have just been far more likely to cut jobs due to substantially decreased profits. Nothing about this = slavery.

Joe is one of many unemployed people due to outsourcing paid for by tax cuts. However, Joe is also a responsible tax payer. When a Wall Street corproation that was deemed to be "too big to fail" was going to declare bankrupcy, the government decided to bail them out. When Joe gets a job, his tax dollars are going to pay for the mulitmillion dollar golden parachutes of the CEOs as well as to pay the salaries of many of the irresponsible wealthy people who put the corporation in that place to begin with.
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No, his salary won't, because the average poor person is not a net taxpayer in regards to these programs. Nothing about this = slavery.


Joe and millions of people like him are doing their part to keep the rich on top for the sake of jobs that will likely be outsourced overseas.
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No, they're doing their jobs in order to get paychecks every Friday, just like everyone else. They get those paychecks. If they don't like them, they can go elsewhere. Nothing about this = slavery.

Becasue so many people are unemployed, Joe is competeing for jobs that pay much lower than his last job. And since so many people are desparate for work they are willing to work for low wages. Since the manufacturing industry is sinking, Joe has to go work in the Service industry which has considerably lower paying jobs. He ends up at McDonalds. Joe plans to save up some money so he can look for a job, but Joe gets sick. Suddenly his McDonald's wages are not enough to cover his medical expenses. He become indebted to the hospital and can't save any money as he pays off his bills. Joe must continue to work at McDonalds to just get by. He has become a member of the working poor.
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Terrible sob story, yet completely irrelevant. Nothing about this = slavery.

When Joe does get an opportunity to get a better job, nobody will hire him because he worked at McDonalds for so long. Joe is out of luck. He isn't even making enough money to save for retirment. However, if he wants to change jobs he certainly can. Many of the companies are using their tax cuts to create more low wage jobs since there are people who will work them. He could move laterally from working at McDonalds to working at KFC.
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More irrelevance. Nothing about this = slavery.

Joe will also be helping pay for the tax cut that lost him his job and that has kept him in low wage jobs. The government had to borrow 700 billion to pay for it so a small amount of that will come out of Joe's paycheck. Joe is all the more poor and the wealthy are all the more rich.
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No he won't, for the reasons stated above. The working poor are not net taxpayers.

And of course, nothing about this = slavery.
 
ender1 said:
The way I see it the big drop in tax rates in 1926 to 1931 looks like it caused the massive unemployment of 1928. When taxes went back up to historic rates in the late 30's and through 1976 it looks like unemployment was around 3%. Then when the taxes rates go down again unemployment went up.

You were trying to prove that higher taxes cause low unemployment right. Because thats how I read the chats.

Im not for raising taxes. Thats what your chart appears to prove though.
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I was looking for evidence that tax cuts leads to job creation. I'm having trouble finding such evidence. Do you have some?
 
hazlnut said:
Census finds record gap between rich and poor



Even if the release of this was timed, it's still relevant to the midterms and taxes.

Now is not the time to give an additional tax break to the wealthy and super-wealthy.
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That's for darn sure. But try to get Reps/cons to understand it. They whine about welfare, but turn the other way when it comes to corporate welfare. And corporate welfare is way more than general welfare. I know that the wealthy provide jobs, but there is no reason to go overboard. Is it really necessary for people to own 7 homes when we have people that have no homes?

In 2007, the latest year for which figures are available, TANF spending on cash assistance (not including child care or other subsidies) came to $4.5 billion. Total commitments to TARP since September 2008 come to $700 billion. So one year of TANF spending equals less than 1 percent of TARP. Citibank alone received $25 billion, five times the cash transferred to mothers and children receiving public assistance in 2007.
Welfare for Bankers - NYTimes.com
 
RightinNYC said:
No he won't, for the reasons stated above. The working poor are not net taxpayers.
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Funny, I never said anything about slavery. My point was that the rich keep the income gap wide in order to keep wages low. Did you somehow miss that?
 
CriticalThought said:
I was looking for evidence that tax cuts leads to job creation. I'm having trouble finding such evidence. Do you have some?
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I dont think those charts are a good indicator for those. There is a suprising relationship with paying high taxes and low unemployment though.
 
RightinNYC said:
I don't know how "Citizens for Tax Justice" is calculating their numbers, but the actual IRS data says they're full of ****.

The Tax Foundation - Summary of Latest Federal Individual Income Tax Data

Average federal income tax rates as a percentage of AGI:

Top 1%: 22.45%
Top 1-5%: 20.53%
Top 6-10%: 12.66%
Top 11-25%: 9.43%
Top 26-50%: 7.01%
Bottom 50%: 2.99%
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HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Dude, its impotant to go by what they actually pay, not by what they are suppose to pay.
 
CriticalThought said:
Funny, I never said anything about slavery. My point was that the rich keep the income gap wide in order to keep wages low. Did you somehow miss that?
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My apologies, it was Moot who was going on about slavery, you were just claiming that the rich were "stealing sweat equity." Substitute that for "slavery" in my previous post and every point still stands.
 
CriticalThought said:
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Dude, its impotant to go by what they actually pay, not by what they are suppose to pay.
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....

That's what my information is - actual information on actual tax returns from the IRS.

Again, read the link.
 
RightinNYC said:
....

That's what my information is - actual information on actual tax returns from the IRS.

Again, read the link.
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That's not what I'm saying. Let me put it in graph form for ya.

Is%20-Tax%20Day-%20Too%20Burdensome%20for%20the%20Rich-%20-%20Powered%20by%20Google%20Docs_1271267556720-thumb-454x287-18279.jpeg
 
RightinNYC said:
My apologies, it was Moot who was going on about slavery, you were just claiming that the rich were "stealing sweat equity." Substitute that for "slavery" in my previous post and every point still stands.
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Uh...stealing sweat equity is not the same as slavery. Try again.
 
CriticalThought said:
That's not what I'm saying. Let me put it in graph form for ya.

Is%20-Tax%20Day-%20Too%20Burdensome%20for%20the%20Rich-%20-%20Powered%20by%20Google%20Docs_1271267556720-thumb-454x287-18279.jpeg
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Me: "Here's the actual hard data from the IRS"
You: "Well, my info from Citizens for Tax Justice says something different!"
Me: "I truly don't give a **** what some partisan advocacy group says, here's the actual IRS data"
You: "Look, let me copy paste a graph from the same document I just linked you to."

Still not convincing.
 
CriticalThought said:
Uh...stealing sweat equity is not the same as slavery. Try again.
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I pretty clearly just acknowledged that they weren't. The point is that your argument is still wrong, as the existence of a free market =/= "stealing sweat equity."
 
RightinNYC said:
Me: "Here's the actual hard data from the IRS"
You: "Well, my info from Citizens for Tax Justice says something different!"
Me: "I truly don't give a **** what some partisan advocacy group says, here's the actual IRS data"
You: "Look, let me copy paste a graph from the same document I just linked you to."

Still not convincing.
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Okay, let me put it this way for you.

My Data: Taxes include all federal, state & local taxes (personal and corporate income, payroll, property, sales, excise,
estate etc.).

Your Data: Federal income taxes.

Get it?

I guess I wasn't too clear.
 
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RightinNYC said:
I pretty clearly just acknowledged that they weren't. The point is that your argument is still wrong, as the existence of a free market =/= "stealing sweat equity."
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Dude, I'm all for a free market. This bull**** we have now is nowhere near a free market. The wealthiest Americans are using the government to keep the wage gap wide and to keep wages low.
 
RightinNYC said:
I don't know how "Citizens for Tax Justice" is calculating their numbers, but the actual IRS data says they're full of ****.

The Tax Foundation - Summary of Latest Federal Individual Income Tax Data

Average federal income tax rates as a percentage of AGI:

Top 1%: 22.45%
Top 1-5%: 20.53%
Top 6-10%: 12.66%
Top 11-25%: 9.43%
Top 26-50%: 7.01%
Bottom 50%: 2.99%
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Lets put it this way. If there were 100 peole and $100 to share what would this look like.

One person would get $23 the other ninty nine would fight over the rest of the $77. The bottom 20 fight over about $3.

When we have to pay the bills:

That top guy pays a lot. About 23% or $5. The bottom 20, who only have $3 to start with only pay about seven or eight cents. The top guy is still left with $18. Thats more than six times what the bottom 20 started out with.
 
Wow. I am so very shocked. NOT:roll::(
 
tell it to watergate wonderboy woodward
 
ender1 said:
Yours of course.
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that's stupid, to get to me you're gonna have to waste every public school teacher in california, if not coast to coast

i'm too smart

and i'm loaded

i don't even need the fat pension i've been promised---it's just more money to give away TO THOSE I CHOOSE TO GIVE IT TO

sorry, i guess
 
The Prof said:
tell it to watergate wonderboy woodward
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Meh. I also don't like my tax money going towards faith based programs and abstinence only education.

Maybe I'll do a Prof an whine about it instead of recognize that the 16th amendment gives Congress the ability to levy an income tax.
 
CriticalThought said:
Meh. I also don't like my tax money going towards faith based programs and abstinence only education.
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as affable, gaffe-able, laughable joe biden said today in manchester---quit whining

the 16th amendment gives Congress the ability to levy an income tax.
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ok, but why did the party punt?
 
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