Another major misconception is that those are the only tax brackets.  Currently there are different tax brackets depending on how you earn your income.  If you make it on investing your money for longer than a year the MAX you will ever pay in taxes is 15%.  Pretty crappy huh?

by Joe Bechtold (8 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 42 comments) on Tuesday, Jan 6, 2009 at 11:49:05 AM

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You may want to take a look at the articles, Who Pays Taxes (part 1) and Who Pays Taxes (part 2) for further insight into the effects of our tax system. 

by PrMaine (13 articles, 13 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 510 comments [22 recommended, 1 rejected]) on Tuesday, Jan 6, 2009 at 4:52:44 PM

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Any discussion of taxes should begin with the obvious: we have way too many taxes.

You are taxed for earning money, you are taxed when you spend money and you are taxed for owning what you bought. (Income, Sales, and property tax.)

At most, we should have just one form of tax.

Another thing you must know, is that each form of taxation isdominate at a different level of government.

Local government uses property taxes

State government uses sales taxes

Federal government uses income taxes.

Of course, there is a lot of overlap, and if we continue the path we are on, all three levels of government we apply all three forms of taxation, in addition to special taxes, fees, etc.

All taxation is a ponzi scheme, which is why it doesn't work. 

by Steve Consilvio (18 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 184 comments [4 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Tuesday, Jan 6, 2009 at 6:34:46 PM

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I understand that libertarians do not like taxation and instead think everyone should pay for their own police, fire and health care.  If they can't afford it, too bad for them.  I get it.   You think all roads should be private toll roads and want to replace stop signs with toll booths.

But the rest of us decided on democracy and equality in America.  That means schools that ALL of our kids can go to, roads that ALL OF US can drive on and police and fire services that come to ANYONE's house when needed.  And courts that don'tlet rich people off while putting the rest of is in jail.  (Yes, this is how it was before democratic government by the people arrived.)

Police and fire and roads COST MONEY.  There are obligations the come with the benefits of being a citizen in a democracy.  We do NOT just want corporations to run things here.  Bush and the libertarian Republicans have brought us pretty close to that but we just voted them out.

So your anti-tax arguments fall flat with me.  I believe in democracy and equality.

by Dave Johnson (49 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 8 comments) on Tuesday, Jan 6, 2009 at 6:57:07 PM

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Democracy and equality are opposites when taxes are involved.

You don't understand the math of money.  And understand taxes even less.

Read my post again.  I didn't say anything against people working together in a cooperative fashion.  It is a good idea to put out fires, etc.  But paying taxes doesn't put out fires.  And you don't need 100 forms of taxation to do one thing; you could just as easily have one tax to do 100 things, but only if you know how to manage people and equipment to begin with.

How we tax has nothing to do with what we hope to accomplish with the taxes, but I would argue we are failing regarding both.

We have two conflicting systems:
a social utopia (we are all equal) and an
economic anti-utopia (greed is good, I must be self-reliant)

You need to understand where and how they are separate, and where and how they overlap.

by Steve Consilvio (18 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 184 comments [4 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Tuesday, Jan 6, 2009 at 11:25:37 PM

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