OT: Rating the President

[Fian]

OK, I looked at your sources, and they still don't quite make sense.

First, what is your source for the wealthy 5% having 35% of the income? I couldn't find that anywhere.

Second, Rush Limbaugh is quoting 2000 data. The budget link you gave me was for 2002-2008. I also couldn't find in there the 46/10/44 breakdown that you gave me. What is your source for that information?

Even with your numbers I calculated the wealthy 5% paying 31% not 21%. Still not great, but not as bad as you were saying.

Here were my calculations:
Wealthy 5% pays 56% of taxes
Your figures state that is only 46% of total revenue. So 56 * 0.46 = 25.76% of total revenue.
Wealthy 5% presumably pays AT LEAST 5% of the total SSN revenue, presumably more since they would pay all the way up to the 77k amount while the poor be paying less. So of the 44% that SSN contributes to the government income, 2.2% comes from the wealthy. So far we are at the wealthy paying 28% of revenue. I then noticed that you were including corporate taxes for your breakdown. If you strip that out, you find of the people tax, the rich pay 31%.

Oh btw, if there are 128 million households, 5% of that would be 6.4, not 8.

[jimbob]

Well I'm not American, so I don't know the ins and outs of your system all that well (though our media is dominated by American interests, so I probably know your system better than you know ours ) --> that's a joke by the way.

One, a rich person is not obligated to understand the life of a poor person, any more than a poor person is obligated to understand the life of a rich person. Not understanding the poor is not a sin.

I agree with this, it's been subtly hinted at for years (decades? centuries?) that if you're rich, you're bad/wrong/immoral. In some cases, individual rich guys are immoral/ungenerous, in other cases individual poor guys are jealous. The role of the gov't and the people who run it is to ensure that there is law and order, safe boarders, and nobody is starving to death - IMHO - not understand what it is to live in another demographic. Empathy is nice, but isn't a pre-requisite to morality.

Accusing the rich of exploting the poor is totally unfair. We don't have sweatshops in the US. If you had the money and power, would you exploit people?

Anyone reading this message has a computer, that puts you in the top 10% (or so) of the wealthiest people in The World. Hope you've made your World Vision donation, and don't shop at Wal-Mart. The fact that you live in N.A., most of Europe, etc. should make you ask yourself, do I exploit people? Me personally - I'm in the top 10% income bracket in the world, and own Nike shoes I don't think I should be complaining about how the top 5% spend their money. Instead I should learn to be generous, and maybe it'll catch on with the big cats.

It should also be noted that while their may be the "bad rich" who supposedly deserve to be taxed into oblivion, income tax is not set up to punish the bad rich. Every rich person is taxed. You are punishing an entire class of people for the sins of a few

Couldn't agree more. The question is, are people generous in helping others. The more it's required by law, the less generous people tend to become - again, totally IMO. No data to back it up, other than the observation of the "I've already helped" mentality.

-jimbob

[Fian]

I don't know about those that are forced to be generous are any less generous when it is voluntary. The US gives much to many other nations, and many US individuals still choose to help those less fortunate tham themselves. Interestingly enough, it appears (ok, I know this is true in Mexico only) that the countries where Americans help, they find that few nationals are willing to join them and help their own people.

Thanks for the support though. It is nice to know that not everyone believes the rich are evil. (:

[tesco samoa]

http://www.theyrule.net/

need i say more

[rextorres]

Originally posted by Fian:
I don't know about those that are forced to be generous are any less generous when it is voluntary. The US gives much to many other nations, and many US individuals still choose to help those less fortunate tham themselves. Interestingly enough, it appears (ok, I know this is true in Mexico only) that the countries where Americans help, they find that few nationals are willing to join them and help their own people.

Thanks for the support though. It is nice to know that not everyone believes the rich are evil. (:

No one said the rich are evil. The point is the tax cut is unfair.

[rextorres]

Originally posted by tesco samoa:
http://www.theyrule.net/

need i say more

Cool!

[Fian]

"need i say more"

It is an interesting website, but yes, please do say more. (: Is being on the board of multiple companies a bad thing? Is it wrong that a wealthy person does have a great deal of influence in American life?