Even with the AMT, Trump paid too little

[desura]

Does that include corporations too, since they are people according to the Supreme court.

Like this typical liberal tech company, always on the right side of social justice issues, but don't even think twice about asking them to pay their fair share while employing people in near slave conditions with suicide nets to keep them from killing themselves, yet they cry for justice to the tax payer funded US courts when someone allegedly copies their rounded corners.

How Apple paid just 0.005% tax on its global profits
http://money.cnn.com/2016/08/30/technology/apple-tax-ruling-numbers/

Not sure if there should be corporate taxes, honestly, corporate taxes just get passed through to individuals and you can tax them on that basis.

 

[bshole]

Why did you choose 70%? Why not 95%? What's your logic behind the number you chose?

Why not make it 100% on everybody? Think of what could be accomplished with that. All income turned over to the government with a stipend given to every warm body within our borders so that everybody is equal. The things a government could do with that kind of income is just staggering to think about.

A bit of a related question. Do you think that $115 million was money Trump could spend as he wished? You know mad money to spend on super fast computers, electronic gadgets, iPhones, weed and slurpees down at the 7-eleven?

Why 70%? Chart it. It really is not rocket science. With a high tax rate on the ultra-wealthy, it reduces their motivation to export jobs overseas to enrich themselves. This has been empirically demonstrated and we have the data. You may be content to sit back and allow the 1% to erase the middle class, export our jobs and purchase our political system, many of us are not.

 

[hal2kilo]

That's just dumb. Fix the tax code...written by congress.

You mean by congressional lobbyists.

 

[Atreus21]

With a high tax rate on the ultra-wealthy, it reduces their motivation to export jobs overseas to enrich themselves.

Explain that please, because I can't make sense of it. You think ultra high taxes on the rich will somehow motivate them NOT to try to reduce costs?

 

[HTFOff]

Duh-vert, huh? There is no reason other than trust in Trump to believe that the fragment of his alleged 2005 tax return is factual in any way.

Given the record, there's absolutely no reason to trust anything he says. Period.

^ Tax Return Truther

NO TAXES! > NOT ENOUGH TAXES! > FAKE TAXES!

Predictable yet delightfully entertaining.

 

[Smoblikat]

Oh noez, he only gave the US gov $38,000,000 (in one year) extra that it would not have otherwise gotten if he wasnt running his businesses. Truly a monster...........

If the gov expected me to pay 38 mil in taxes in just one year, id be completely and hopelessly screwed. This issue is irrelevant unless you plan on outdoing him on the amount of taxes you pay.

 

[desura]

Some of the rich do useful things like Elon Musk.

The rest are pouring the money inflating asset prices and stupid social media junk.

 

[Fern]

Ideally, I'd like to see any income over say $2 million be taxed at a 70% rate.

Trump earning $153 million or so in 2005 and paying $38 million in taxes is only 24%.

As a tax professional, the MSM and many of the posters here make my head hurt.

Our (net) income tax rate is applied to taxable income. It has always been that way. Trump's taxable income as reported on his tax return is $31.5 million. His tax is $38 million. That's a tax rate in excess of 100% of his reported net taxable income under the regular regime.

Income of $158 million? I can't reconcile to that reported amount. The only way I can get close is to add only gross income, and only positive amounts too. Comparing only (positive) gross income to income tax is utterly f@cking meaningless. It's nonsensical.

"Gross income" is reported on line 22 of page 1. Trump's gross income is only $49.5 million. The $158 million is a nonsense number likely manipulated for some political point. (Note Trump's gross income is actually about $52k higher due to nontaxable interest income etc).

Adjusted gross income is on line 37. Taxable income is line 43 of page 2.

I don't believe I've seen one single thing reported correctly under the theories of accounting or tax law.

What is the definition of fake news? IDK, but everything I've seen certainly qualifies as erroneous bullshit.

Moreover, Trump was taxed under the Alternative minimum Tax regime (because it results in a higher tax due than the regular tax regime). The MSM, non-tax professionals, and many CPA's don't understand and aren't familiar with the AMT. Everyone's talking about Trump taxes and rates. YOU PEOPLE AREN'T EVEN LOOKING AT THE CORRECT DAMN FORM.

Fern

 

[bshole]

Explain that please, because I can't make sense of it. You think ultra high taxes on the rich will somehow motivate them NOT to try to reduce costs?

Well it needs to be connected to a tax cut on the middle/low classes.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/taxana...y-jobs-but-what-about-tax-hikes/#bf92938bf929
-

Some economists went even further, arguing that tax increases on the rich might actually be expansionary. A Robin Hood approach to fiscal policy – taking more from the rich and spending more on the poor – would shift money from those with a low propensity to spend to those inclined to spend every dollar they earned. The end result in a demand-starved economy? Faster economic growth.

“We must increase the incomes of those who desire to consume, and reduce the incomes of the very wealthy,” advised one economic thinker in 1932. “We can do that through higher taxes upon incomes in the upper brackets, through higher taxes upon profits, through very much higher taxes upon inheritances.”

Tax experts were inclined to agree. “The income tax is like the human heart,” observed New York lawyer Charles A. Roberts in 1931. “Business depression represents a stoppage or sluggishness of the two streams which are the lifeblood of commerce. The tax draws in the moneys which have become stagnant, and pumps them into forcible circulation in the stream of general buying power, restoring the vigor of our commercial life.”

Of course that doesn't really back up my original assertion. The rich didn't get to export jobs until they had corrupted the political process with their money. If we could remove their ability to do so and get our political system back and responsive to the majority of Americans, we could get productive change in that sphere.

Bottom line though, my original point fails because I could not back it up. I remember hearing an argument like it before and it stated that because there was so little extra income the rich could get due to the extreme high tax rates, they weren't that interested in exporting jobs. I could not find any sources that say that anything like that anymore.