It is hard to accumulate wealth when you are taught/forced to spend, borrow, spend, borrow, and then borrow some more, while getting taxed and inflated into oblivion.

Hopefully, someone in CA or IL will win, because those states sure could use the tax money.

The real culprit is double (and sometimes triple) taxation. I dont hold out hope for real reform under any administration in my lifetime. Welll....maybe Rand Paul in 12 years.

LMAO. Got to love Jerry Brown defending his proposal as a "millionaire's tax" when its on income >250k. He says "If you make 250k you can be a millionaire in 4 years if you save it all". Definitely did too many drugs in the 60s.

I guess school teachers are millionaires, too. Everyone is a millionaire!

Now explain why thats a bad thing. And at the same time why don't you check out how many of todays top 10% of income were in the top 10% 10, 20 and 30 years ago.

Hint: The bottom 20% and top 20% of income have roughly equal probabilities of being in the middle 20% in less than 10 years.

liberal wikipedia tho

Explain.

i dont think that can be refined any further

I want to hear why it's obvious that people with a higher income should pay more. Don't we all ,like, use the same roads etc? If we all benefit equally, shouldn't we all pay equally?

If you are a borrower inflation is good. DUCY?

Rich people clearly benefit more from police, defence, corporate tax loopholes and just the general social order and construction of America. That is why they are rich.

We do not all benefit equally. The head of WalMart takes greater advantage of the roads to earn money than I do. He makes use of police and contract enforcement to secure his large amount of wealth more than I do.

There is nothing equal in the amount of services the wealthy get compared to you or I.

Do you think it's obvious that "we all benefit equally"?

OK, I did this calculation myself.

The top 10% of income earners pay 21% of federal expenses with their income taxes (FY2011). Their income is 43% of all income (using 2009 numbers here).

There's two factors at work:

1) Income tax is a minority of federal revenues. The talking point about how so many people don't pay income tax is pretending that income tax is all that matters, but it's not.

2) Deficit spending means that nobody is paying their fair share. We consume far more government than we pay for.

---

Calculations:
<sup>During FY 2011, the federal government collected approximately $2.3 trillion in tax revenue or 15.4% GDP
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_...federal_budget
During FY 2011, the federal government spent $3.60 trillion on a budget or cash basis
http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html -- Top 10% pay 70.5% of income taxes
individual income taxes are 47% of revenues

1.081B income tax revenue
0.762B income taxes paid by top 10%
0.762 / 3.6 = .21</sup>

at least we are all protected from the evil-doers equally

Even taking into account marginal utility people with more to lose are protected more from having it protected than those with less. So no.

I appreciate you actually providing data, but I would include payroll taxes in this sort of calculation.

i dunno, ive met heaps of people far more wealthy than me or you will ever be, and i don't think their lives are worth more than either of ours. so we are protected from them terrorists nuking us equally

im talking about human lives and the dangerous muslims here phill

The argument isn't "do we have equal access to roads?" Obviously as individuals we do.

The argument that "we are all protected from foreign meanies" also isnt helpful. The interests abroad of the wealthy get far more protection than do my non-existent ones.

just think of the benefits being reaped by the poor in this country by virtue of simply being an american and not a poor indian, south american, or asian.

you are the ones shopping at walmart, not slaving away in sweatshops producing the goods.

AND we aren't being nuked, usa number 1

snaggle, arent you the guy who talks about how the rich in the military industrial complex create wars to further get rich a lot?

Cos that is a pretty good example you should break out about why the rich get more out of the entire American experience than the average person.

And they still clearly get higher utility out of stopping Muslims from tanking the stock market crashing planes into skyscrapers.

Cmon, you are better than that.

That isnt even close to the same topic of why the rich should pay a higher tax rate than the middle class and lower class.

phill,

i agree that the rich get far more utility out of most every facet of our government

im just happy to know my tax dollars are protecting me from getting nuked by the iranians just as they are protecting willie nelson, tim cook, and mrwookie. im just having a laugh

If it was up to the kool aid drinkers here, people with higher incomes should pay much more than they already are. You see, we have waaaaaay too many people who think they know everything, when they know ****.

But thats OK..because the comeuppance is going to be a bitch for the know it all kids that we have in this generation. These are the people that will be crying in 20 years or so (when they're in their "max paying" years) and their tax rate is going to be 40-45%. Then you can look back on this idiot who runs the country today and thank him for not addressing a serious problem, all the while spending 2 years of his so called "presidency" jamming a healthcare plan through(like this is the most important thing at the moment). 5 trillion added to the deficit in 3+ years..with no end in sight AND this ****ing balloon of a healthcare plan. Yes..lets raise taxes on those who pay already (and lets keep coming back at them for the next 4 years if im elected) AND keep spending. Awesome economic outlook for the country I predict.

The fact that this administration continues to dole out trillion dollar budget deficits should make everyone outraged. The fact that most idiots including your president somehow think raising taxes on the upper % is going to make things better should be insulting to everyone's intelligence..... but apparantly we are not all intelligent.

Much like raising taxes on certain goods which then trickle down to the consumer, the same effect will happen when you continually batter the people who already pay the lions share of taxes. Jobs will be lost and downsizing will ensue even further (this has already happened). You, your wife, aunt etc...might get laid off. Here's a newsflash for all of you...NOT EVERY BUSINESS OWNER IS NAMED BUFFETT OR TRUMP.

Think about this when you're in your late 30's-40's when youre making 70k and paying a tax rate thats astronomical. Because at the rate we're going the govt is going to have to come after everyone hard (not only the "rich"). And boy, godforbid anyone one of you becomes a small bus owner that does well...you'll see what the **** I'm talking about.

Someone is needed to make some bold steps and NOW. If you think that person is obama, you're just not that smart even if you think you know everything.

But your tax dollars are subsidizing wars to benefit the rich that make the Iranians want to bomb us all.