Quote:
Originally Posted by Captain Oi!
Not sure how old you are ,CDL, but the price jump in a decent school district and child care can be a second rent.
My AGM is married to a server in an upscale restaurant, they have a 4 year old and a 2 year old. Their rent in a mediocre good school district is $1600 and their childcare costs are about $400 a week, only needing 3 nights of 9 hours each. 9-5ers in the same income household need 40 or so hours of childcare which can easily be $600. I'd guess they pull around $100k/yr but these people shouldn't be paying a dime in income taxes because they can't afford to save on a down payment on a house from which they could be deducting interest when they're paying interest and property taxes through their rent.
Its just another regressive element of our tax system. Renters get hosed when landlords charge their tenants for interest they get to deduct. And their childcare deduction maxes out at $6k, I think, when the basic needs of anyone with kids under 5 require paying double or more than more than triple that, no matter what their income.
yes, I am aware. I believe this is why we should find a way to provide this child care (at a high quality level) for all. this would allow parents to continue working as many of them cant justify it financially. This solution would require we rake in more tax income which, even if applied proportionally across income classes, would benefit the lower classes more because the benefit of the service they receive is a much larger percentage of their income.
My friends just had twins and they had every intention of both continuing to work yet the math didn't work out in a manner where that made sense and she ended up quitting her job and withdrawing from the labor force even though she would rather be working all because it would have cost more for schools than she would have brought home after taxes.
This is my whole argument re: taxes. If you tax all classes at the same rates, but provide a much much more robust set of public services then you are creating an effectively higher tax rate on the rich and lower tax rate on the poor because the use of these public services will be relatively stable across classes. Thus, the same monetary benefit is a much larger tax rebate to the lower class than it is to the upper class. I am all for increasing taxes and increasing social services, but think it should be done for all.
If every adult gets $10k in public service benefits and every kid gets $20k (pulled out of my ass) then then family of 4 making $50k in income and paying 40% (also pulled out of my ass) has $30k in take home pay and $60k in benefits for a real income of $90k post tax. Meanwhile the one making $100k has $60k in take home but the same $60k in benefits and thus is at $120k post tax. Thus, even though one family is "making" double and their tax rate is the same they are really only 1/3 better off and not twice as well off. The same family of 4 would have to earn $200k (or 4x as much) to be twice as well off as the family making $50k.