Obamas 250K tax line? protests make no sense?

[RCG Trader]

Quote from tomdavis:

It depends upon your point of view. If you believe that peoples' earnings belong to the government that then decides how much of it people get to keep, then you're probably in favor of high taxes. If you believe that one person getting rich causes another person to be poor, then you probably believe that taxes should be high.

When I hear people say that tax cuts are a "giveaway to the rich," I have to laugh. Tax cuts don't "give" anything to anybody. Tax cuts allow people to keep more of the money that was theirs to begin with.

Even when I had no money, I was never out to punish the rich or make them pay their "fair share." I don't even know what "fair share" means. Is it 50%? 90%? 99%? How much is fair?

And please don't tell me that rich people once paid 90% tax rates in this country. It's a myth. It's true that there were "published" tax rates of 71-94% back in the 1950s-1960s, but nobody ever paid taxes at those rates. Back then, there was something called "leveraged non-recourse tax shelters." A study by the IRS in 2003 showed that the richest people in the country paid about 25% of their income in federal taxes during the 1950s-1960s. Wealthy people dramatically lowered their effective taxes rates through the use of tax shelters. The "effective tax rate" on the weathiest taxpayers was actually 25%.

Somebody please tell me: What does "fair share" mean? I'm not interested in a philosophical answer. Give me a specific number.

In a democracy, there is no such thing as "fair share". That is your answer, but it is one that is unpalatable to politicians. The paradox is, a government by the people is who put those politicos there.

What will have to happen is that people who feel that taxes and entitlement are onerous will have to move. That is what is short circuiting the system. The states were designed for movement. If you bitch and moan and complain, but don't vote with your feet and your wallet and at the ballot box then you are actually part of the problem rather than the solution.

 

[Trader666]

+1

Quote from tomdavis:

When I hear people say that tax cuts are a "giveaway to the rich," I have to laugh. Tax cuts don't "give" anything to anybody. Tax cuts allow people to keep more of the money that was theirs to begin with.

 

[trefoil]

Quote from RCG Trader:

In a democracy, there is no such thing as "fair share". That is your answer, but it is one that is unpalatable to politicians. The paradox is, a government by the people is who put those politicos there.

What will have to happen is that people who feel that taxes and entitlement are onerous will have to move. That is what is short circuiting the system. The states were designed for movement. If you bitch and moan and complain, but don't vote with your feet and your wallet and at the ballot box then you are actually part of the problem rather than the solution.

You don't get something for nothing.

It costs to enforce the commercial code, to enforce customs, to keep you and yours safe, to give you roads that won't break the axle on your car, to educate your children, to pay for the military that, once again, keeps you and your property in one piece, to give you a government that does its job without having to resort to the kind of massive bribery that makes Mexico such a pleasure to live in, for instance.
If you don't want to pay for those things, Mexico awaits. Or any other dysfunctional place where you have to, instead, pay for armed guards with trained dogs just so you can sleep at night.
You don't, and never will, get something for nothing. And the rich pay more because they're the ones who will get kidnapped or killed for what they have, and they have actual property that needs to get protected.
I've said this before, to the amazement of some of the ignoramuses on this site, and I'll say it again: even Adam Smith recognized this as a basic fact of life, and a just one, as well.
Because.....

You don't get something for nothing.

 

[Yannis]

Barack Obama thinks your rights come as a license from government.
Robert Romano, Senior Editor of (Americans For Limited Government) ALG News www.getliberty.org

"Speaking in Cleveland, Ohio recently, Barack Obama said, “I believe government should be lean; government should be efficient. I believe government should leave people free to make the choices they think are best for themselves and their families, so long as those choices don’t hurt others.”

“This is like a drunken sailor calling for moderation,” ALG's President Bill Wilson said.

“This is the most bloated government in human history. It hoards 650 million acres of federal land, has nationalized housing finance, health care, and the rest of the financial industry. It has taken over GM and Chrysler. It has spent itself into a $13.4 trillion hole of debt that is weighing down the economy, and its only solution to spend even more,” Wilson explained.

Wilson continued, “Under Obama’s watch, government now has seized the power to force individuals to purchase health care. It seeks the power to restrict energy usage. It has locked up the nation’s natural resources and limited energy production, including nuclear. It continues to blackmail states into accepting federal funding, uses the tax code for social engineering, and utilizes the threat of government regulation to shake down privately-operated businesses.”

“Barack Obama has no credibility at all on this issue. The federal government is not lean. It is not efficient. His statement is nothing more than electioneering, smoke and mirrors by a very desperate administration,” Wilson added, saying that the rhetoric was intended to minimize damage to Democrats in the November elections.

Wilson also noted that Obama “has it exactly backwards when he says government should leave people free to make choices. The government does not have the rightful power to restrict choices by the people in the first place.”

Wilson called Obama’s philosophy of rights “troubling because it implies that the individual right to choose to better themselves comes from government.”

Wilson concluded, “The people do not derive their rights by the license from the government, as Obama implies. Instead, individual rights are derived by virtue of one’s existence. A former professor of constitutional law ought to know that government derives its just powers from the consent of the governed. It’s the government that should be on a leash, not the people.”

Let's remind elected leaders that their powers are derived solely from your consent. Tell them government is not lean, and it is not efficient. And urge them to sell off federal land, denationalize housing finance, health care, and the financial sector; to get rid of GM and Chrysler; to pay down and retire the debt; to repeal the individual mandate imposed by ObamaCare; not to restrict energy usage and to instead unlock the nation's natural resources; to stop blackmailing the states with federal mandates; to end social engineering via the tax code; and to stop using regulation as a means of shaking down private businesses."

 

[slsimpson]

The reason the wealthy saw such a decrease in taxes paid was primarily because the tax rates you are discussing is for working wages. Non-working wages, such as capital gains etc actually dropped down to 0-15%. Very few lower to low-middle class have anything BUT working wages. The upper echelon can have as much as 75% non-working wages.
And the reason the poor people are complaining about the repeal of the Bush tax cuts is because they believe the BS they are told by those that would see the Bush tax cuts kept (these seem to be the ones with money in their pockets from the upper echelon)