News:

         
Welcome to FJowners.com


It is the members who make this best place for FJ related content on the internet.

Main Menu

Some facts on income and tax rates in the USA.

Started by terryk, March 04, 2012, 12:50:20 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

terryk

1. Income is not all that unequal.

Actually it is. Since 1980 the top 1 percent has increased its share of the national income by an astounding $1.1 trillion. Today 300,000 very rich Americans enjoy almost as much income as 150 million.

Since 1980, the income of the bottom 90 percent of Americans has increased a meager $303 or 1 percent. The top 1 percent's income has more than doubled, increasing by about $500,000. And the really, really rich, the top 10th of 1 percent, made out, dare I say, like bandits, quadrupling their income to $22 million.

Meanwhile a full-time worker's wage was 11 percent lower in 2004 than in 1973, adjusting for inflation even though their productivity increased by 78 percent. Productivity gains swelled corporate profits, which reached an all time high in 2010. And that in turn fueled an unprecedented inequality within the workplace itself. In 2010, according to the Institute for Policy Studies, the average CEO in large companies earned 325 times more than the average worker.

2. Inequality doesn't matter because in America ambition and hard work can make a pauper a millionaire.

This is folklore. A worker's initial position in the income distribution is highly predictive of how much he or she earns later in the career. And as the Brookings Institution reports "there is growing evidence of less intergenerational economic mobility in the United States than in many other rich industrialized countries."

The bitter fact is that it is harder for a poor person in America to become rich than in virtually any other industrialized country.

3. Income inequality is not a result of tax policy.

Nonsense. A painstaking analysis by economists Thomas Piketty, Emmanuel Saez and Stefanie Stantcheva found "a strong correlation between the reductions in top tax rates and the increases in top 1% pre-tax income shares from 1975–79 to 2004–08". For example, the U.S. slashed the top income tax rate by 35 percent and witnessed a large ten percent increase in its top 1% pre-tax income share. "By contrast, France or Germany saw very little change in their top tax rates and their top 1% income shares during the same period."

4. Taxing the rich will slow economic growth.

An examination of 18 OECD countries found "little empirical support for the claim that reducing the progressivity of the tax code has spurred economic growth, business formation or job growth."

Indeed, Piketty, Saez and Stantcheva's rigorous analysis came to the opposite conclusion. Our economy may be growing more slowly because we are taxing the rich too little, not too much. Economists Peter Diamond and Saezestimated the optimal top tax rate, that is the tax rate that would maximize revenue without slowing economic growth, could be as high as 83 percent.

Redistributing income stimulates economies in part because when 1% make more they save whereas when the 99% make more they spend. As a result, according to Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody's, a dollar in tax cuts on capital gains adds .38 cents of economic growth while a dollar in unemployment benefits gives the economy a boost of $1.63 and a dollar of food stamps adds $1.73.


Rich Pleines

Rich Pleines
"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one"


simi_ed

Well, the smart one has spoken, I guess there's no need for more input ...  :drinks:
-- RKBA Regards,

Ed
===
Ed Thiele 
Simi Valley, CA -- I no longer have SoCal manners.
'89 FJ12C (Theft deterrent Silver/White)


- All that is necessary for the forces of evil to win in the world is for
enough good men to do nothing.

- Edmund Burke

Dan Filetti

Digression being the better part of valor, I'm opting not to engage.  In fact, I did not even read it as I knew I would not agree.

Dan
Live hardy, or go home. 

simi_ed

-- RKBA Regards,

Ed
===
Ed Thiele 
Simi Valley, CA -- I no longer have SoCal manners.
'89 FJ12C (Theft deterrent Silver/White)


- All that is necessary for the forces of evil to win in the world is for
enough good men to do nothing.

- Edmund Burke

The General

Quote from: simi_ed on March 04, 2012, 03:52:01 PM
Yup, me too.
..... aaaaaagh, c`mon guys, `av a go.  (unless of course he`s right?)  (popcorn)
`93 with downside up forks.
`78 XS11/1200 with a bit on the side.
Special edition Rocket Ship ZX14R Kwacka

craigo

And here I thought this was a FJ motorcycle website and not an economics/political one.  :negative:
I'm sure there is just something wrong with me. :dash2: :dash2: :dash2: :dash1:

CraigO
CraigO
90FJ1200

simi_ed

Sorry, I'm at the point where if he told me the sun rose in the east, I'd need independent verification.

My $0.02 (USD)
-- RKBA Regards,

Ed
===
Ed Thiele 
Simi Valley, CA -- I no longer have SoCal manners.
'89 FJ12C (Theft deterrent Silver/White)


- All that is necessary for the forces of evil to win in the world is for
enough good men to do nothing.

- Edmund Burke

Dan Filetti

Quote from: Dan Filetti on March 04, 2012, 03:30:53 PM
Digression being the better part of valor, I'm opting not to engage.  In fact, I did not even read it as I knew I would not agree.

Dan

That is; DISCRETION ... or digression as that case may actually be...  Damn spell check fixed it incorrectly for me.

Dan
Live hardy, or go home. 

craigo

Quote from: Dan Filetti on March 04, 2012, 05:31:57 PM
Quote from: Dan Filetti on March 04, 2012, 03:30:53 PM
Digression being the better part of valor, I'm opting not to engage.  In fact, I did not even read it as I knew I would not agree.

Dan

That is; DISCRETION ... or digression as that case may actually be...  Damn spell check fixed it incorrectly for me.

Dan

At least you know what that button on the bottom right does.  :good2: But I think you got it right the first time.  :sarcastic:

Take care,

CraigO
CraigO
90FJ1200


rktmanfj


winddancer

Here is my stick to stir the pot  :diablo: why can't we do a flat tax get rid of child earned income and all other tax write off except business losses and charge everyone 7% fed and 3% state then everyone pays there fair share. You could also take away sales tax we then could get out of this mess we are in .  :crazy: :wacko2:

bugboy

I say we do the flat tax thing also,,,,,

but add in a provision for the liberals to voluntarily pay additional tax for all the "bleeding heart entitlement programs" they seem so dead set on supporting.  There could also be a plan for the ultra-conservatives to kick in extra money to pay for the extra babies resulting from no abortions and no contraceptives.

Dick Cheney and his pals can kick in extra for all the damn wars they want to get into.

Those that want to have lots of illegal immigrants around can kick in extra for bilingual education/signage, health care, extra prisons and etc.

Flat tax = infrastructure, education, public safety and homeland defence.  All the other crap gets paid for by the "radicals" on either side.

And do away with Congressional pensions,,,,, those rich SOB's don't need free money for life given the quality/quantity of work they do.


Kurt