How do you justify taxing the rich?

Many rich people made the decision to get an education and work hard for their money. Why should I, an uneducated idiot, stand by and watch other people take initiative and do what I chose not to do? Why should I not get a piece of what they have?

Your future, as an uneducated, lazy, idiot, is shopping at "The Wallmart" and supersizing people at a fast food joint. It's very rare to see a BMW or Mercedes park in front of a Wallmart or driving through a fast food order lane. That should tell you all you need to know about money.

Are those the only justifications you've encountered for progressive taxation? You must not be very well read.

Bat Masterson wrote:

Are those the only justifications you've encountered for progressive taxation? You must not be very well read.

All the typical justifications for progressive taxation are dressed up variations of these basic themes. Most progressives do not explicitly identify the premises they operate on, but here they are.

Political Philosophy wrote:

Bat Masterson wrote:

Are those the only justifications you've encountered for progressive taxation? You must not be very well read.

All the typical justifications for progressive taxation are dressed up variations of these basic themes. Most progressives do not explicitly identify the premises they operate on, but here they are.

If those are your only interpretations it's not that you're not very well read, it's that you're poorly educated and likely unable to for cohesive thoughts. Instead of jerking off to pictures on Ayn Rand you may want to spend that time educating yourself so you're a functioning member of society.

Rich are the only ones with real money to pay for the bills of society. So none of the above from your choices.

How about the simple justification that the rich should pay the same percentage in taxes as the rest of the population? It turns out the tax rates right now are pretty flat (~40%) once you factor in all the taxes except for the really wealthy (they drop to the low 20s for a guy like Bill Gates) and poor (if you only make 10k a year, you don't pay any net taxes)

Keith Stone wrote:

If those are your only interpretations it's not that you're not very well read, it's that you're poorly educated and likely unable to for cohesive thoughts. Instead of jerking off to pictures on Ayn Rand you may want to spend that time educating yourself so you're a functioning member of society.

Sorry, there's one I left out: the art of blanking out. Say one thing, refuse to identifiy the meaning of the statement you made, then blank out and hysterically evade the subject matter when someone points out the contradiction. Take shots at your opponent's education to distract onlookers from your obvious incompetence. If all else fails, look for a spelling or grammar mistake to shift the focus of the argument. Anything to weasle your way out of the debate.

asdfasdfas wrote:

How about the simple justification that the rich should pay the same percentage in taxes as the rest of the population?

That's not progessive taxation. Different argument.

I don't know if your comments are flippant and juvenile on purpose, but very few people seriously believe any of those things. A more reasoned argument is that society has treated you well for whatever reason and thus you'd do well to give back (higher taxes) when you have the means to do so. Hypothetically, why has society treated you well? To be non-PC, you (the royal 'you') are likely a white male who grew up middle to upper class with parents who went to college or further training beyond HS. That gets you a head start right off the bat whether you want to believe it or not. This isn't a bleeding heart liberal argument, as I think many non-white, non-males coming from poor families certainly can make a go of it in this country more so than anywhere else in the world - I'm arguing that you're getting a head start because of the family you were born into. If this is true, then the wealth you accumulate is a combination of not only your talent, hard work, perseverance, etc, but also the family setting you were born into - or, luck. If that is the case, then it only makes sense to give back, at least something, that was truly "given" to you.

Is that fair? Who knows. Am I telling you that you should give back in the form of higher taxes? Can't answer that either but I'd look at the shrinking middle class and the gathering of wealth at the top as a signpost as to where we as a country are headed and if you think that's a culture you want to pervade.

Keith Stone wrote:

If those are your only interpretations it's not that you're not very well read, it's that you're poorly educated and likely unable to for cohesive thoughts. Instead of jerking off to pictures on Ayn Rand you may want to spend that time educating yourself so you're a functioning member of society.

Dearest Keith,

You should get acquainted with the concept of proofreading.

Sincerely,

Letsrun

I concur.

7) The rich's material success in life is in part due to all the people they have interacted with through the course of their life. Their experiences with all of their teachers, coaches, friends helped form the person who was able to make millions of dollars.

Anyone who has helped a rich person become rich should deserve some of his profits (as a side point, this is the societal level analog to complaints of the disparity betweeen CEO and low level employee pay in corporations). Practically, you see this in rich people donating to the schools that they attended. This justification may argue for increased charity instead of increased tax on the rich, but I believe the increased tax is a necessity because most rich do not realize that much of their success is due to others.

Which of your six justifications does mine fall under?

Political Philosophy wrote:

Sorry, there's one I left out: the art of blanking out. Say one thing, refuse to identifiy the meaning of the statement you made, then blank out and hysterically evade the subject matter when someone points out the contradiction. Take shots at your opponent's education to distract onlookers from your obvious incompetence. If all else fails, look for a spelling or grammar mistake to shift the focus of the argument. Anything to weasle your way out of the debate.

In this instance, it seemed appropriate to mention Keith's spelling mistakes.

If each kid, from the moment they were born was given an equal opportunity to succeed in life, then I would agree that taxing the rich more than others would not be fair. This is not the case and, if the rich weren't taxed more than the poor, you would see the income and education gap grow larger and larger until the poor get so pissed off that they start a revolution and the rich folks lose their heads. What's worse? Paying taxes or eventual civil war? Ask the Russians.

The current taxation system may not be fair to the guy who comes out of poverty to make his own fortune, but it is equally unfair that some kids are not given even close to the same opportunities to succeed in life. In a strictly capitalistic system, there will be no public schools, so poor kids won't be educated and will work the streets like in many Third World countries. Also, democracy doesn't work without an educated population. People will still vote if they aren't educated, but their choices will be made based on which politician has the catchiest slogan, rather than who will make the best choices if elected. Oh wait, that already describes the U.S. to a tee. In effect, you have a country that is not governed by the people, it is governed by major corporations who can afford lobbyists who will bribe Congress and brainwash the people into accepting the kind of country that works for them (and makes their Board of Governors multi-millionaires). Remember how long it took for the Government to accept that smoking was bad for your health? Scientists had been saying so since the 1920s. The same thing is still happening, only now it's big energy lobbyists trying to dismiss climate change or food corporations looking for subsidies and policies that are friendly to them (if unhealthy for consumers). From what I've heard on this message board, it seems to be working.

Strictly speaking I don't support taxing the rich more, I support higher tax rates (not necessarily taxes) on accumulated wealth. If the wealthy don't want to pay so much on taxes, then they are free not to pay them. Just don't be so wealthy and take so much income. The bottom line is that the vast majority of people who make over a $1 million/year don't provide the value to society that merits that income. Their income causes inflation, welfare benefits are indexed to inflation, welfare goes up, then people blame welfare. Thats BS. SS recipients never asked for the inflation, wealthy people did. Its a multi trillion dollar 3 card monte con job on the poor and middle class.

Lots of REALLY rich people (Buffett and Gates for example) don't mind being taxed, and in fact both of them have said numerous times that they should have to pay more. I agree with that. Wealthy people ought to pay a larger percentage of their income for public services than poor and middle class people. And NO, I don't think this keeps them from being rich or discourages them from making money, and I also don't think this discourages someone who has yet become rich who now will not try to become rich just because of increased taxes...that's what opponents of higher taxes for the wealthy like to say, but it's BS. "Oh...I was pumped to start this new company that would revolutionize the world and would likely turn myself into a billionaire, but because of the taxes that would be involved, I'll just become a CPA and make $70,000 a year."

I didn't realize that only the rich were taxed.

It is a progressive tax system.

The rich are taxed the same as everyone else at each of the initials levels of income.

Everyone is taxed 10% for the first $12K of income, even the rich.

Everyone is taxed 15% for the next $33K of income, even the rich.

yadda yadda yadda

Those that have more than $373K of taxable income are taxed at 35% for the amount made above $373K but at the lower rates for the first $373K.

So your eat the rich question could be expanded to include eat the middle class since they pay a higher marginal rate than the working poor.

Now the reason for this progressive system is two fold:

One- There is a total tax dollar revenue target needed to cover minimal expenses. A flat rate would either not generate enough revenue if it were too low or would put a serious strain to cover living expenses on lower income people if the rate was too high.

Two- Additional money is easier to make when you are a higher income. To make an additional $10,000 is quite a task for someone making $20,000/year. But gaining $10,000 when you are at $100K/year does not require the same increase in production. If you are at $1M/ year you could easily make that just by moving money you already have, not much effort there.

So while the $20K guy earns an extra $10K and nets $8,500 the $1M guy has to earn an extra $13,077 to net that same $8,500. But even with that handicap the rich guy has a much easier time netting the extra $8,500.

I'll add a 7th choice

7) The rich can absorb more of the costs at a higher marginal rate since they make such a disproportionate amount of total income combined and they utilize the organized society in the form of infrastructure and customer base to do this.

So you think being rich should exempt someone from taxes? Are you saying only low and middle income people should pay taxes? Are you saying there should be no taxes? Are you objecting to progressive taxation? Are you just trying to start yet another of these non-running threads that crop up here?

Anyway, it's in the interests of wealthy people to have some mechanism that reduces the gap between the very wealthy and everyone else. When that gap gets too big you begin to have a society that resembles a lot of the Third World. I expect that anyone who is truly wealthy that wanted to live in a Third World country would just move there and that few of them really want to live in such a place. And if you reduce enough of the masses to desperation you get revolutions, sometimes violent, sometimes electoral, and the result is a very dramatic redistribution of wealth.

Essentially you justify any social or economic policy by arguing that it results in a better society. Once you've decided that there is justification for taxes the rest becomes a matter of working out details.