New IRS federal income tax data demonstrates that the U.S. individual income tax continues to be very progressive, borne primarily by the highest income earners.
Wow - you really didn't think this post through did you. If you did, it's even more concerning that you don't know how math or graduated tax systems work.
The big banks are all tied to the government and these entities have immense power and pull. We also seen threat of bank accounts being frozen or seized during the plandemic.
It's funny, once my net worth got well into 6 and then 7 figures, the bank basically started harassing me and calling me repeatedly asking what I was doing, why I quit my job, if I needed any financial advisors to assist me. I went in there and gave those crooks something to remember. After that maybe they didn't like me as much but they sure as hell respected me. They just see a rich person as an object and a cash cow for them. My "service fees" and other fees were noticeably different--they think they can just sneakily steal from the rich.
So many on here are advocates for 1/2 billionaires and billionaires. Half billionaires and billionaires must be telling their bookkeepers to post on letsrun today.
Billionaire advocacy group completely ignores payroll taxes when trying to make people feel sorry for billionaires.
The only tax analyzed here is the federal individual income tax, which is responsible for more than 25 percent of the nation’s taxes paid (at all levels of government). Federal income taxes are much more progressive than federal payroll taxes, which are responsible for about 20 percent of all taxes paid (at all levels of government), and are more progressive than most state and local taxes.
Lower income people pay state taxes, sales tax, gas tax, and real estate taxes through their rent. Looking at Federal collections understates their tax contributions.
Romney lost an election in part due to his mention of the lack of low-income Federal tax contributions. He forgot about state, local, and sales tax. He also forgot that people don't like being called freeloaders.
But It is hard to soak the wealthy to close our deficit or debt. One problem with income inequality is that we don't have many millionaires or billionaires. Nor do we have a wealth tax, which has a long record of failure (capital is mobile-See the France example).
Increasing taxes on the rich can help, but it puts a mere dent in our debt.
Consider a static plan to cut our debt by 2% each year by taxing the top 1% each year (a 50 year plan).
So 2% of our national debt is roughly $600 billion a year. By definition, there are about 1.2 million families in the top 1%, so you’re asking that we tax them an average of about $500,000 a year each. According to the IRS, the average family income in the top 1% is about $1.6M, so you’re proposal involves raising taxes on the top 1% by an additional 30% or so on top of today’s rates.
So we might imagine that we can pull this off, but remember government spending has grown 2-3x faster than GDP and in this example, the debt is assumed not to grow.
You know why, according to Federal reserve data the bottom 50% of taxpayers only own 2.6% of the entire countries wealth. So yes, their percentage is going to be a lot lower because they’re so poor.
These payers would all be in the 0-15% tax brackets. So all these flat taxes would take even more money from the poor.
why does this matter with the flat tax talk going around? The U.S. is consumer driven country, with the poor spending the most of their income on stuff (Rich people keep more money than they spend), so higher flat taxes would mean less overall spending on goods, meaning a lower U.S. GDP, meaning companies earning less $$$, and the wealthy earning less stock returns and growth in their businesses. This is why most republicans hate the flat tax idea….it’s against their interests because it would hurt them just as much as the poor in this country. Don’t listen to the outliers that are just trying to get attention with dumb bills that would never pass.
I am volunteer at a tax clinic preparing poor people's taxes. I can tell you these don't pay taxes because they literally cannot afford to... I prepare people's taxes from anywhere from 10k income to 35k in income. These people literally need every penny to live, they have no savings. No retirement etc. And even more sad, they are taking care of disabled grandparents that have no retirement. We are basically a poor country, that's why people so many pay so little in taxes. Yes, the rich do indeed to pony up and pay a lot more.
"Federal Income Taxes" do not include Federal Payroll Taxes, which are regressive, or state income taxes, state property taxes, state sales taxes and user fees (which can be hefty, like car registration and licenses), or local sales taxes and user fees. All told, taxes are regressive and impact the lower half much more seriously than the upper half, whose basic lifestyles aren't impacted at all.
Put down your pitchforks. The wealthiest 10% pay a big majority of federal income taxes. Pick up your pitchforks. The story is more complicated than that.
