A graphical assault on supply-side tax cuts

[Zaap]

Of course consumption taxes affect the wealthy in insignificant ways. That's why their income taxes need to be higher, to spread the tax burden as a % of income more evenly.

For once, we're in agreement. Consumption taxes are the worst way to levy taxes if you want to do it fairly.

Expecting the rich to pay a 'fair share' of them somehow, vs a much more logical income tax system is pure madness to me. It'd be the greatest boon the ultra wealthy ever had, any of these schemes people float to replace income taxes with them. The wealthy would simply stop visably consuming (they have numerous ways to do this that only they can afford) while the poor and middle class would get stuck with all the burden.

 

[ElFenix]

Show me where the rich are purposefully not paying state taxes as part of this whole dastardly 'not paying their fair share!' meme.

Its obvious as the nose on your face why a tiny percentage of a states population wouldn't be paying the lions share of a sales tax or other fees not based on income. They'll pay more closer to thier much smaller percentage of the population... a fact your argument exploits purposefully even though there's nothing nafarious about this.

Please do show me though where the rich pay less state income taxes in the states that have them than others... a true 'fair share' argument. I'd like to see it.

i don't think you understand a word of what i'm saying, nor the implications of it, and such lack of understanding is completely willful and intentional on your part.

For once, we're in agreement. Consumption taxes are the worst way to levy taxes if you want to do it fairly.

Expecting the rich to pay a 'fair share' of them somehow, vs a much more logical income tax system is pure madness to me. It'd be the greatest boon the ultra wealthy ever had, any of these schemes people float to replace income taxes with them. The wealthy would simply stop visably consuming (they have numerous ways to do this that only they can afford) while the poor and middle class would get stuck with all the burden.

who is arguing for a consumption tax?

 

[Sonikku]

And in large part, they do. Despite all the myths to the contrary.


And how about his VERY FIRST cannon on taxation? 😉

I. The subjects of every state ought to contribute towards the support of the government, as nearly as possible, in proportion to their respective abilities; that is, in proportion to the revenue which they respectively enjoy under the protection of the state.

Okay so...

Hint: the top are doing this. The middle is arguable. The bottom 40%...

... got NO business quoting Adam Smith on taxation from any sort of high horse position. 😛

But that graph is misleading. You're taxed out the ass in the bottom end of the 10% percentile. It's the 0.1% at the tippy top that pay some of the most envious tax rates around. Romney could pay a tax rate in the single percents if he wanted to. When someone talks about making the super rich pay their fair share they aren't talking people making $140,000. That ain't super rich by any stretch of the imagination.

 

[dank69]

i don't think you understand a word of what i'm saying, nor the implications of it, and such lack of understanding is completely willful and intentional on your part.




who is arguing for a consumption tax?

Eskimo is, because when combined with a prebate set at an appropriate level it could make the system very fair. Zaap doesn't seem to understand the prebate part.

 

[sm625]

But smaller gubmint anyway, right?

That way, Capitalists can take over govt functions, make a profit & make the Rich even richer.

Privatize everything, right? Just give it up to the hedge fund Gods of Wall St & pray for the best.

You have a fundamental misunderstanding of what limited government means. Limited government does not mean that greedy evil capitalists come in and take over what the government was doing and somehow make even more money doing it. Government is force. Corporations do not have that kind of power. They cannot confiscate wealth by force through any means except government. Limiting the size and scope of government limits their power to extract wealth by force.

The concept of privatization has nothing to do with limited government. You can privatize the installation and operation of a million traffic light cameras and body scanners, but that does not means you've limited government power or reach. Limiting government is about rescinding whatever laws were put in place that necessitated the cameras and scanners.

 

[dank69]

You have a fundamental misunderstanding of what limited government means. Limited government does not mean that greedy evil capitalists come in and take over what the government was doing and somehow make even more money doing it. Government is force. Corporations do not have that kind of power. They cannot confiscate wealth by force through any means except government. Limiting the size and scope of government limits their power to extract wealth by force.

...

Bullshit. You have the fundamental misunderstanding. No government and there is nothing stopping corporations or anyone else from using force to take everything you have. Additionally, force isn't the only way to fuck your ass raw. Monopolies and artificial supply shortages will have you sucking dick for clean water for your family in your utopia real quick.

 

[werepossum]

Growing revenue needs, yeah. To the tune of approximately 500 billion a year.

If $3.6 trillion in tax revenue doesn't get you where you need to go, then the problem is not with taxes being too low. What this government doesn't get from its taxpayers, it goes to China for.

When those in government make some attempt to make spending follow income, then I'll listen to arguments for increasing taxes. Until then, people should be allowed to keep as much of what they earn as possible.

You're missing the most important part - the money you spend doesn't have any magic unless government takes it away from someone else and gives it to you. Government takes less of your money = bad things. Government gives you more money = good things.

 

[werepossum]

Lol, you're flailing now. If anyone is trying to spin it's the guy who is desperately trying to declare that only some taxes count.

I couldn't care less what you think rich people should do as far as sales taxes are concerned. It's up to you to tell me why you think a dollar in income taxes should count as money you are paying towards society but a dollar in sales taxes shouldn't. This is in fact a super easy question to answer. When you want to look towards what people are paying towards government you simply look at all the dollars they give to government.

You have inadvertently stumbled on exactly my point though. When everyone pays exactly the same amount to register their car, the poor are paying a MUCH higher proportion of their income for it. So while rich people pay a higher federal rate, poor people often pay a higher state and local rate. You want to ignore one and not the other because you're too proud to admit you said something dumb.

I don't think you could legitimately count payroll taxes, as they are a forced retirement and insurance program rather than supporting government's other activities. For the others, I agree. Although a different way to look at it would be that the federal government's operations are largely funded by rich people (or at least high earners) whereas state and local governments are funded much more evenly, which has a disparate effect on low earners. Probably one reason is that very high earners often can move away from high tax states and localities without losing the benefits of being Americans.

One big thing we could do to more equalize income would be to treat all income equally. After allowances for inflation for long term investments anyway.

 

[Jhhnn]

Supply side theory is and has always been a bunch of nonsense to cover up the fact that cutting taxes for the rich is simply a way to enrich the rich. They just came up with a good story to sell to the rubes. And the rubes bought it. That's why they spend so much money on think tanks... so they can come up with ways to manipulate the narrative to get people to believe that up is down. And it works.

You have a fundamental misunderstanding of what limited government means. Limited government does not mean that greedy evil capitalists come in and take over what the government was doing and somehow make even more money doing it. Government is force. Corporations do not have that kind of power. They cannot confiscate wealth by force through any means except government. Limiting the size and scope of government limits their power to extract wealth by force.

The concept of privatization has nothing to do with limited government. You can privatize the installation and operation of a million traffic light cameras and body scanners, but that does not means you've limited government power or reach. Limiting government is about rescinding whatever laws were put in place that necessitated the cameras and scanners.

You apparently don't see the contradiction in that. You've been fed the whole smaller gubmint song & dance so that the explosive growth in income at the tippy top can escape taxation much the same way it escaped working people getting a piece of it. Offshoring, automation & technical improvements cut us right out of the money flow. If we can't get it with work then we have to get it with taxes or our share will continue to decline.

 

[dank69]

You're missing the most important part - the money you spend doesn't have any magic unless government takes it away from someone else and gives it to you. Government takes less of your money = bad things. Government gives you more money = good things.

When we don't understand things they tend to look like magic.