Why Tax Rates are Low but Opposition Is High

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Anyone with an agenda can pick out some individual tax and write an article about how "this" or "that" tax is lower than it has been in the past. Such deception is especially useful when trying to get people to vote for new taxes for themselves or others.
The reality, however, is that cumulative taxes are devastatingly high and, along with monetary policy and government regulations, are responsible for many of our economic problems. For most people taxes are the single largest expense (when summed). In Oregon, for example, for every dollar of value someone creates by work, almost 60 cents gets taken through taxation and regulation. People don't realize it, though, because it is dozens of smaller taxes spread all throughout the system.
I have a novel idea: How about all of you who are for higher taxes just pay them yourselves instead of trying to take money away from your neighbors to pay for what you want?

Seth Murray of OR 2:49PM May 22, 2011

Eric showed us that nearly half of the population paid no federal income tax in 2008. Don't forget that lots of people got laid off that year. Also, Eric shows that the top 1% pay a lot of tax on their 300k plus ANNUAL income. But he didn't tell us that the top 1% also OWN MORE THAN HALF of the nation's WEALTH. The nation's wealth is not correlated with ANNUAL income. And let's not forget that those in the lower brackets pay a big percentage of their income in payroll taxes, which are capped at 108k of annual income.

Steve of TN 5:12PM May 20, 2011

Very funny Syd.
HAHAHAHAHAHAH!!
Sucking the Federal Teat and complaining about unnecessary government intrusion our daily lives.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!! 2:12AM May 01, 2011

Yes it is funny, but not for the same reasons that you mention. The 50% that is paying virtually no federal income tax makes less than $33k per year. Why some people are so indignant that these folks aren't paying more taxes is what's funny to me. Frankly, I don't know how these people are even surviving to begin with, and you want them to pay MORE tax? Yes, very funny.

Syd of CA 1:21PM April 24, 2011

In reference to Eric of OH:
The perception that the rich (top 1%) don't pay enough taxes is due to the disparity in both annual income and accumulated wealth. When you're trying to live and take care of your family with an income of $50,000/year or less, and have no accumulated wealth, then a 38% tax on the top 1% doesn't look very big.

Ed of CO 3:08PM April 18, 2011

You control our world. You’ve poisoned the air we breathe, contaminated the water we drink, and copyrighted the food we eat. We fight in your wars, die for your causes, and sacrifice our freedoms to protect you. You’ve liquidated our savings, destroyed our middle class, and used our tax dollars to bailout your unending greed. We are slaves to your corporations, zombies to your airwaves, servants to your decadence. You’ve stolen our elections, assassinated our leaders, and abolished our basic rights as human beings. You own our property, shipped away our jobs, and shredded our unions. You’ve profited off of disaster, destabilized our currencies, and raised our cost of living. You’ve monopolized our freedom, stripped away our education, and have almost extinguished our flame. We are hit… we are bleeding… but we ain’t got time to bleed. We will bring the giants to their knees and you will witness our revolution!
Sincerely,
The Serfs.

viola perry of TX 8:46AM April 14, 2011

It's funny, really...
The whole article is about how people FEEL about something that they don't actually know anything about. You ask the average person how much his tax REFUND was, and he can probably tell you immediately. How much did he PAY in taxes? If he knows the actual amount he's very rare.
Let's cut through the mythology and look at the data from 2008, which is the most recent year available for which IRS data is essentially complete. (Why 2009 isn't ready, I couldn't tell you.)
The first column is income level by percentile, the second is the actual dollar amount you had to have earned to be in that spot and the last is the amount of Federal Tax Revenue that group paid.
The first thing to notice is how little you have to earn to be in the top 1%. For all the talk about Millionaires and Billionaires, the vast majority of the top 1% are NOT represented by the Paris Hilton's of the world.
The second thing to notice is that it's only a little over half of people who are paying Federal Income Tax at ALL, and the third is probably how much they are paying.
The top 25% pays over 85% of all Federal Income Tax, and the top 1% pays close to half of that.
The bottom 47% of taxpayers pay NO income tax. They probably THINK they do and would be shocked to discover otherwise, but Social Security & Medicare/Medicaid contributions are NOT income tax.
======================================================
Percentiles by AGI || AGI Threshold || % of Fed Personal Income Tax
____________________________________________________________
Top 1%........................$380,354..........................38.02
Top 5%........................$159,619..........................58.72
Top 10%......................$113,799...........................69.94
.
Top 25%......................$67,280.............................86.34
Top 50%......................$33,048.............................97.30
Bottom 50%................<$33,048...............................2.7
======================================================
I'll leave you with two last thoughts...
First...
The political class has made a career of buying their way into office by bribing the American Public with it's own tax dollars. Most of them (and while the GOP has plenty to answer for, this is more a Democrat problem), seek to continue to try to do that with an ever shrinking tax base that is being commanded to pay an ever enlarging percentage of this bribe. At what point does it end? Before or after more than half of the electorate is a net CONSUMER or tax dollars?
Second...
I hear a lot of hue and cry to make the tax code "fair" and make the "rich" pay their fair share.
Take a good LONG look at those figures I posted and think hard about the ancient admonition to be careful what you wish for.

Eric of OH 4:16PM April 13, 2011

The Right has exploited Reagan's success to instill into the minds of Americans the LIE that lowering tax rates of the rich to ridiculous rates is gonna somehow help with economy without hurting revenue. The rich today are paying extremely low rates, taking advantage of loopholes. And corporations either have to pay an extremely high rate (35%) or, if they're smart enough, pay little to nothing thanks again to loopholes.
The American public is not reliable when it comes to stuff like this. They say they want low taxes and smaller government, yet they are against cutting the very programs that are so burdensome on the budget.
The only real solution is to cut spending in areas like the military, shut down redundant agencies, raise taxes on the rich, close loopholes and lower corporate taxes.

Niceguy 11:43AM April 13, 2011

It used to be 25%. The Defense budget has DOUBLED in 12 years. THAT is a waste.
Social Security AND Medicare pay for themselves OUTSIDE TAXES - payroll deductions. A tweak in the wage base used to calculate deductions would take care of any outages in these two. Of course audits to streamline costs are also needed. They are NOT tax issues.
Corporate taxes collected are 20% of what they were under Eisenhower. When did corporations who were highy profitable in the Esenhower years suddenly need lower taxes?????
So - the GOP is in denial - if they think we can run this country with no one paying taxes. Let's move all military bases and government processing centers out of "red" states, as they clearly don't want to pay for them....

DeeToo of SC 10:52AM April 13, 2011