This is an innocent question, so please don't start hurling fireballs at me.
Why can't everyone just be taxed the same? How is it fair that just because you work harder and earn more that you have to pay more? Why can't everyone just be taxed the same, regardless of income?
English
-
if you took away one whole paycheck from a normal person they would notice. if you took away 1 million dollars from a billionaire they wouldn't notice. sanders wants to tax the uber rich because it wouldn't have an impact on them or the normal people besides making the normal people a little less in hell.
-
Let's say I make $100, and you make $10, and we both get taxed 10%. That leaves me with $90, and you with $9. In this analogy, I could easily survive with being taxed 25%. I'd still have $75 in pocket, much more than your 9. I'm still. Making more money than you, even being taxed more.
-
Because the wealthy save far more of their income than the middle and lower class do. When the wealthy save so much money, it acts like deflation on our economy - killing off the middle class and consumer spending, exactly as we see today. Unbalanced taxes, while they may seem unfair, are necessary to balance this difference. In the short run, tax cuts may benefit the wealthy. But the ensuing economic issues will hurt everyone.
-
The thing is that not everyone "worked harder" to become more wealthy. While hard work is a significant factor, the sad truth is that many people don't have the option to just "work harder" to become more successful. The problem is that equal opportunity is something that doesn't exist.
-
It doesn't exist to you because you don't believe in working hard for success. It does work and it's usually the only way to become successful.
-
A flat tax is how our system should be
-
Some days I feel the same (mainly when I am in my tax classes lol) But it is simply a check and balance to tax the wealthy more than the poor. With all of the power come responsibility. Are we not our brother's keepers? Is the government an institution designed to manage our collective well being? I think some people on both sides of the aisle lose sight of that.
-
Edited by Kruze: 1/28/2016 12:55:17 AMA flat tax rate in terms of percentage of income would [i]theoretically[/i] be the fairest option. Unfortunately, theory and reality are often different. In reality, a progressive tax is more "fair" because corporations and high net worth individuals often cannot act honestly - they use loopholes available in the system to avoid being taxed on money that they "hide". The simplest example of this is corporations hiding income in offshore accounts to avoid taxation on that income. People like to chop it down to "hatred" or "jealousy" for wealthy people. That's not the case. Wealthy people try their hardest to avoid taxes and often end up not paying their fair share of taxes. That aside, taxing the poor more is obviously not going to do anything but make their lives harder. However, taxing the wealthy at higher rates does have some arguments. One argument is that nobody actually [i]needs[/i] millions or billions of dollars that they just sit on without investing back into the economy, and therefore taxing at higher rates is beneficial to society as a whole. A lot of people don't like this idea and see it as "stealing" from people who "work harder" (often not the case, but that is a separate topic). To take everything into perspective, take this fact and think about: 62 people in the world hold more wealth altogether than the poorest 3,600,000,000 people. People will argue that they earned their wealth, though that is often not the case. The Walton family for instance did nothing but inherit, as one example.
-
The only problem with your theory is that taxing the rich more will just make them leave and take their jobs with them. This is already a major problem in why we've lost so many jobs and why so many companies have left the US. We already have the highest corporate tax in the world. Progressive tax would make it worse. Flat tax is fair and I think most business owners would get behind it.
-
Where are they gonna go? Would it be a bad thing if they left? Couldn't we have more start up businesses this way?
-
Edited by OdinsDaDdy: 1/28/2016 1:34:46 PMThey go to places like China and Mexico. With the loss of jobs and the labor participation rate lower than ever you'd think that would be a boon for small business. But when your government regulates small business to death it becomes nearly impossible for them to make it. So you tell me. Why aren't small businesses thriving already?
-
Because we don't shop there with the fear of spending an extra $10. We've done this to ourselves.
-
Taxing the rich heavily would just make them look for even more loopholes. Look at all the corporations moving their factories to different countries.
-
It's also because of cheap labor and free trade agreements
-
Edited by NoZakuBoy7337: 1/28/2016 12:38:06 AMBecause you have big cooperation families who own things like Walmart that have more money than they'll ever need. Sure a doctor and a slightly above minimum wage person's tax rates shouldn't be very different. But when you have a millionaire who has millions of dollars, shouldn't they have to pay just a tiny bit more? I mean, I think about it this way: Then these people also make profits off of a normal, working class person's spendings. So if poorer people are taxed less, then they have more to spend, right? By association the richer make more money, and therefore have a tiny bit taken away from them to make up for it. It's not like they're living hard anyway they're profiting off of the working people. And consider: Taxes don't exist just because it's fun to take money away, they pay for schools, public roads and services we need. Always remember, Communism isn't socialism. Don't go red. c:
-
Because big corporations like Walmart store money into offshore bank accounts so they don't get taxed properly, so that's money coming out of the economy and not going back into it. In addition to that, they pay their employees horrible wages that result in a lot of people drawing welfare, which results in more money being lost and tax payers paying even MORE. Whereas other countries have been doing this for a while and are doing just fine. It's because people think socialism = communism and people think we're still in the Cold War.
-
You assume they work the same. I worked in a bank, I did -blam!- all. I made very good money. I guarantee the cleaner worked harder than me and got paid a lot less.
-
[quote]so please don't start hurling fireballs at me.[/quote] hahahahahahahaha
-
Edited by premo253: 1/27/2016 9:48:49 PMIt's not fair. You are totally right in your assumption. A flat tax would be the "fairest" tax system however those calling for taxes on the rich are not actually wanting fairness, they are either wanting handouts or to punish the rich due to any number of reasons to include jealousy. The absolute "fairest" system would be a flat purchase tax to collect revenue. Because with very few exceptions, everyone has to buy stuff.
-
Or that they've been exploiting loop holes for years while the rest of us have been paying.
-
The problem is that they are laws written into the tax code passed and approved by the government. People love to blame corporations for literally following the law. Blame the real guilty parties. The politicians who passed these laws and allowed for these exemptions. Both legislative and executive branches.
-
Which their campaigns were paid for by those corporations to get those laws.
-
Edited by premo253: 1/28/2016 12:26:27 PMThis is the real problem. Congress is making money off of the backs of the American people and BECOMING millionaires because of their position. [quote]Based on 2009 data, there are currently 66 in the Senate and 179 in the House (among current voting members). So while just 1 percent of Americans are millionaires, 66 percent of senators are millionaires, as are 41 percent of House members.[/quote]
-
And then they go on to sit on the boards of the companies that they've helped
-
Right. So again it's the political class that is to blame.