An Idiots Guide to Inequality Part 1

Lafayette said:

The sort of excuse that one can expect of anyone unable to understand profound concepts.

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iLOL
There is nothing profound about the idiocy you provided.

DA60 said:

Profound?

You want to tax certain people 100% and you call that profound?

I call it utter nonsense.

So if a poor, destitute fellow wins the lottery...you want to take 100% of his winnings so he is destitute again?

So if a senior sells the family home that they have owned for 50 years and they have a capital gain of $1 million (because it turns out the land her house is in is suddenly extremely valuable)...you want to tax her all of it and she ends up with nothing?

So, if an owner of a family business that he has built up from nothing and always put every extra cent of profit back into the company now sells that business for $2 million profit...you want to take all that profit and render his life's work economically useless?

So, if a stock that a family has held for generations...suddenly skyrockets and they sell it for a multi-million dollar profit...you want to take every penny of that capital gain?

There is nothing profound about a 100% tax rate.

It is ridiculous and tantamount to theft.


Oh...and if you are only talking about taxing income and not capital gains then you are clueless on this as well as almost all the money the mega rich make are capital gains.


Man, you must REALLY resent rich people.

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Hey, socialistic government programs are expensive. It takes a lot of government overhead to guarantee equal outcomes, and, as usual, those socialistic programs have to be paid for with other people's money.

There's nothing new here. If you want to see the results of such ill conceived programs, just have to look at the current state of Venezuela.

soot said:

That $100K number is kind of stupid.

Why should a family of four earning $100K a year be entitled to not only less than their "fair share" of that total pie, but less than half of their "fair share"?

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The $100K annual income level is not "stupid". What is, however, both stupid and unfair is the fact that effective tax-rates above $100K per year (with a clever accountant) are about 15/20% per year.

Fairness in taxation is mathematically progressive, and progressive taxation should look like this:


Except the percentages vertically should rise to 100%, not 35%. Were that the case, a lot fewer selfish "banksters" on Wall Street would be tempted to make a quick megabuck as they did with the Toxic Waste Mess.

Which is what provoked the Great Recession in 2010 - now six-long-years old.

That which I find "stupid" is the fact that household incomes above $100k are taxed at a flat-rate of less than 30% (and often even less if a number of legal reductions can be made). The effective rate above 100K is perhaps in the range of 15/20%. (Remember Romney in 2010 when he foolishly admitted that he had paid only 14% in income-taxes? That probably cost him the election.*)

About 10% of households above the $100K Income Level garner nearly half the total income generated by the economy, as shown by economists Piketty & Saez here. It is precisely this group therefore that should be paying far higher taxes, which would be the case were tax-levels progressive.

But, they aren't, so the rest of us are victims of the biggest tax rip-off in history ...

soot said:

This doesn't take in to account peoples' skills, abilities, education, ambition, contribution or otherwise - it's just flat rate math.

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No income-tax on earth does or should. What difference do skills mean to tax-authorities? Nothing.

soot said:

If the country's total GDP were divided by the country's total population and distributed equally every man, woman, and child would be entitled to roughly $50K.

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Really? Go have a look at the US budget - then tell me how the US is going to obtain the money to pay for your retirement pension or the national debt.

Taxation is unavoidable ...

*And the fact that the Dork hasn't paid taxes in perhaps a decade or so doesn't seem to bother anybody ... ?

DA60 said:

Profound?

You want to tax certain people 100% and you call that profound?

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And we don't exact capital punishment for killing people?

The 100% would apply to marginal-income after a very high income limit (during the tax year). That is, a 100% percent marginal-tax.

If we do not stop the mindless rush of income into wealth, whereby only 20% of families possess 80% of all wealth, then we are one day risking a major explosion of rioting and mayhem of catastrophic proportions. (Often the subject of sci-fi movies, but completely in the realm of non-fiction.)

Mark my words - it is not the first time this has happened in our history. The 1880s/90s were a very turbulent part of our history, when labor strikes caused many deaths. Don't believe that? OK, see here: List of worker deaths in United States labor disputes.

But it IS the first time that the population has owned so many guns (ie, the means) with which to do cause major mayhem*. It can happen ...

*Americans seem to think that because "they own a gun", they won't be the ones to get shot in a shoot-out. When push comes to shove, in a riot, the bullets are everywhere ...

Lafayette said:

And we don't exact capital punishment for killing people?

The 100% would apply to marginal-income after a very high income limit (during the tax year). That is, a 100% percent marginal-tax.

If we do not stop the mindless rush of income into wealth, whereby only 20% of families possess 80% of all wealth, then we are one day risking a major explosion of rioting and mayhem of catastrophic proportions. (Often the subject of sci-fi movies, but completely in the realm of non-fiction.)

Mark my words - it is not the first time this has happened in our history. The 1880s/90s were a very turbulent part of our history, when labor strikes caused many deaths. Don't believe that? OK, see here: List of worker deaths in United States labor disputes.

But it IS the first time that the population has owned so many guns (ie, the means) with which to do cause major mayhem*. It can happen ...

*Americans seem to think that because "they own a gun", they won't be the ones to get shot in a shoot-out. When push comes to shove, in a riot, the bullets are everywhere ...

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So over what amount would you tax 100%? Is that capital gains and income?

DA60 said:

So over what amount would you tax 100%? Is that capital gains and income?

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Something tells me I am not going to get an answer.

Lafayette said:

"An Idiots Guide to Inequality" - Part 2



*And the only way to fix that error permanently is rid ourselves of fixed-rate taxation above $100K of income yearly and institute a progressive taxation up to and including 100% beyond a certain megabuck income.

DISCUSS

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why is the left's solutions always to take more from those who are productive? 100% tax rates-what an idiotic idea

Lafayette said:

The $100K annual income level is not "stupid". What is, however, both stupid and unfair is the fact that effective tax-rates above $100K per year (with a clever accountant) are about 15/20% per year.

Fairness in taxation is mathematically progressive, and progressive taxation should look like this:

Except the percentages vertically should rise to 100%, not 35%. Were that the case, a lot fewer selfish "banksters" on Wall Street would be tempted to make a quick megabuck as they did with the Toxic Waste Mess.

Which is what provoked the Great Recession in 2010 - now six-long-years old.

That which I find "stupid" is the fact that household incomes above $100k are taxed at a flat-rate of less than 30% (and often even less if a number of legal reductions can be made). The effective rate above 100K is perhaps in the range of 15/20%. (Remember Romney in 2010 when he foolishly admitted that he had paid only 14% in income-taxes? That probably cost him the election.*)

About 10% of households above the $100K Income Level garner nearly half the total income generated by the economy, as shown by economists Piketty & Saez here. It is precisely this group therefore that should be paying far higher taxes, which would be the case were tax-levels progressive.

But, they aren't, so the rest of us are victims of the biggest tax rip-off in history ...



No income-tax on earth does or should. What difference do skills mean to tax-authorities? Nothing.



Really? Go have a look at the US budget - then tell me how the US is going to obtain the money to pay for your retirement pension or the national debt.

Taxation is unavoidable ...

*And the fact that the Dork hasn't paid taxes in perhaps a decade or so doesn't seem to bother anybody ... ?

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why does someone else existing create a just claim on what I have?