Yes I Want a Change

[FlyersFan]

Hold on, relax... Im not attacking anyone for what they do.

But lets get real here for a second.

a.) There are things government has to do, because companies dont do it well (lets start with the ARMY, and go from there)
b.) Someone has to pay for it

If I am going to choose who to tax, my priority list goes like this:

1.) Dead people and people who receive money for free (estate tax)
2.) People who are doing well enough that the extra tax money wont hurt them (i.e. they will still have their 1st and second house, enough to eat, enough to fly commercial almost wherever they want, and enough to go to the titty bar at least once a week - something you can do easily on 200k even at 30% tax)
3.) People who are already struggling - 100k and lower primarily

The alternative is to tell grandma she gets no Medicare. You can talk to the moon about government programs and such, but thats like trying to solve a problem related to paying $1000 extra in mortgage on a $3k per month budget by eliminating a $50 cable bill. Important, yes, but not real impactful.

The reality is that we have a choice. Put our kids in a position where they will have to live with 50% and higher taxes the rest of their working lives, or bite the bullet now, and if you have the means to live with higher taxes (i.e. you aren't starving) - generally, you pay for them. The obligations coming up from medicare and social security are amazingly high. The obligations from the wars we might have to fight are amazingly high. The obligations from paying interest on the money we are borrowing to bail out Bear Stearns, Freddy Mac, and Fannie May, are incredibly high. The cost to solve global warming is incredibly high. That means we of means, and that really should be those of us who are doing well enough such that gas doesn't really matter that much, should be putting in more.

I don't want to punish anyone. But we either charge ourselves, or our kids, or the people who are making less than enough to pay the bills as it is. Cause someone is going to pay the bill.

fish- sorry if im jumpy but ive just had enough. i hear you but here's my point.....quit enabling people to freeload. quit giving illegals money and proposing to give the Social security....quit giving section 8 housing to young black mothers with 4 kids at age 22 with no job and no dads around. quit giving my money away!!! you wouldn't have all this defecit crap if you quit handing out money to people for nothing.

see, that's just my point. where in your agrument have you talked about cutting federal spending programs in favor of other ones like education? how about telling people to **** off like Kevin says if you're not with the program (ie illegals). how about black leaders doing something about the 51% single parent households (ie no 2nd parent in the picture at all) and stop tossing money at them in the face of free housing, food stamps, meal programs in schools etc.......you wouldn't have to tell grandma no medicare if you weren't telling cheech, chong, chenqua etc...to come on over and grab a nice wad of cash, a nice section 8 voucher and let us know if there's anything else you need....and don't worry about work or paying anything back....Matt will pick up your tab for you. he's a hard worker and earns a good living....

Kevin my man, i couldn't have said it better....:thumbs:....all the liberals want to do is come after the people who already pay about 80% of the taxes in this country, instead of stopping all the pan handling in all these different forms of social programs.

i mean fish, when the "successful" in this country already pay the majority of the taxes, how much more of a burden do they need to bear?? and who are you to tell me that it's OK to tax wealth that's been built up in a family. the government has already taxed that money about 30 times already...do we need another 40% in taxes? and once again fish, you're telling my cousin who probaby makes about 400K a year that he doesn't need to fly first class??......he EARNED that right......key word EARNED...it's not for anyone else to tell him he can't do that so that some dead beat can get a section 8 voucher. Go to Cincinnati Ohio and check out what section 8 housing has done to the west side of town. nobody works, they treat their property like **** and have literally ruined an entire side of town.....all free of charge on the government...and you know who they fked.....THE WORKING MAN.....the plumber, the electriciain, the truck driver....all saw their property values killed, they now live in mixed neighborhoods of section 8 and regular homes where the section 8 homes have destroyed neighborhood property values and the esthetics.......


sorry but you'll never convince me in a million years that doing anything but cutting wasteful spending programs on illegals, dead beat parents etc...is the way to go.

i heard it best from a democratic caller on a radio show this week...."the democrats used to represent the working man, now they represent wellfare and handouts to enable the lazy to stay lazy"

[homedawg]

3.) People who are already struggling - 100k and lower primarily

Struggling or not, I know a couple that makes close to that, they file their taxes separately, 1 gets back more than paid in, the other gets back half paid in, after all is done, they haven't paid ****!

Keep that thought on increasing the tax% on those that currently pay most of the tax $$'s collected in the U.S.!

They have been moving offshore, and more will soon follow! :thumbs:

Where does that leave your plan? :beer2:

[Q-Unit]

Don't forget about Travis Henry

[Kevin]

I know how to fix the deficit and all financial issues.

Put free condom dispensers next to all public mailboxes in Los Angeles, New Orleans, NY.
Evander Holyfields house and Tacoma Washington.

Then all the people who are having 10-12 kids who shouldnt be having any kids wouldnt be having any kids and the welfare system wouldnt be so expensive and killing our taxes.

Also, round up all the illegal immigrants. Give them two choices. 1. GO HOME. 2. Male registers for our military for 4 years and earns citizenship. Rest of family registers, gets social security numbers and pays taxes on income instead of draining the system.

No fairness in being an illegal and draining our country of it's resources without being a productive member of society.

If I was an illegal, I too would wanna live here and take advantage of this great country's resources, but I'd sure as hell make sure I gave something back. My wife knows of ******* illegals filing 15 on their w-4 not paying a dime while collecting all kinds of neat benefits.

Something needs to change and fast. Our country is getting bought out by other countries and soon we're going to start having their morals, values and ideals shoved down our throats.

Mosques in your neighborhoods. Car bombings on U.S. soil. ETC. These ****ers need to get their **** straight. SOONER than later.

[Fish2006]

lol...you know skins, i just am trying to find the point where it became a bad thing to be successful in life and work hard.

that was just a bad broad based generalization that doesn't fly with me.

It is ******* AWESOME that you do well. Anyone who does should feel good about that. Nobody is proposing we go back to what was in the Eisenhower years, with 90% marginal tax rates on the highest income. Hell, if I were in charge, I would get rid of state government, let the feds take over, and split the difference, which would get us on par with Europe for a total tax rate. They pay about as much in taxes, but get way ******* more in services. Our rates may "technically" be lower at the Fed level, but when you add up state, county, FICA, medicare, sales, bla, bla, bla, and thumb tax, we are actually higher than most places other than perhaps Scandanavia. And even there, at least they have hot chicks.

But meaning in life doesnt come from money. And frankly, under most plans, if you take the money you make and create more jobs, or invest it, you aren't being punished by higher rates on W2 wages anyway. Hell, you could take the money, start a series of small businesses, employ a ****load of people, and not pay a dime in taxes under Obama.

Thats the whole point. Creating a system that incentivizes that which is the best for the largest number of people is the goal. Having entrepreneurs work hard and create jobs - that is a GREAT thing. Nobody would argue with that.

What gets my goat is that it feels like the last 20 years (no, I am no Clinton fan either) we have been burning our house down in order to heat it. And we will stick our kids with the bill.

[Fish2006]

hey fish- i really really really resent you making everyone out to be some corporate lazy clown that does well in life. I started a business from scratch. if you've never done it you won't even have the faintest clue how hard it is. it's the hardest thing you can ever do work wise in life. you put all your eggs in a basket and take more risk than most people ever will in life. i employ people, purchase goods from other vendors etc.......and now i am penalized because my business was successful???....:dunno:

that fking pisses me off to no end when i hear you talk about "outsized rewards" and my blood is boiling as we type this.

you obviously seem to have something against people who do well in life. but go ahead, tax the **** out of me...and then all my workers can say bye bye to their child care, health care, bonuses etc....cause the government is going to have all my money.

dang that pisses me off fish that you lump everyone who does well in life into the category of lazy corporate guy. there are plenty of americans who do very well, never took a thing from anyone and now you want to penalize the entreprenuers in this country that are the life blood of what this country is supposed to be about.....?? :puke: typical fking liberal point of view.....

and who are you to judge whether someone making 400K earns it or not.?? my cousin worked his ASS off to get where he is and he works as hard as anyone and does very very well in a corporate environment.........

Hold on, relax... Im not attacking anyone for what they do.

But lets get real here for a second.

a.) There are things government has to do, because companies dont do it well (lets start with the ARMY, and go from there)
b.) Someone has to pay for it

If I am going to choose who to tax, my priority list goes like this:

1.) Dead people and people who receive money for free (estate tax)
2.) People who are doing well enough that the extra tax money wont hurt them (i.e. they will still have their 1st and second house, enough to eat, enough to fly commercial almost wherever they want, and enough to go to the titty bar at least once a week - something you can do easily on 200k even at 30% tax)
3.) People who are already struggling - 100k and lower primarily

The alternative is to tell grandma she gets no Medicare. You can talk to the moon about government programs and such, but thats like trying to solve a problem related to paying $1000 extra in mortgage on a $3k per month budget by eliminating a $50 cable bill. Important, yes, but not real impactful.

The reality is that we have a choice. Put our kids in a position where they will have to live with 50% and higher taxes the rest of their working lives, or bite the bullet now, and if you have the means to live with higher taxes (i.e. you aren't starving) - generally, you pay for them. The obligations coming up from medicare and social security are amazingly high. The obligations from the wars we might have to fight are amazingly high. The obligations from paying interest on the money we are borrowing to bail out Bear Stearns, Freddy Mac, and Fannie May, are incredibly high. The cost to solve global warming is incredibly high. That means we of means, and that really should be those of us who are doing well enough such that gas doesn't really matter that much, should be putting in more.

I don't want to punish anyone. But we either charge ourselves, or our kids, or the people who are making less than enough to pay the bills as it is. Cause someone is going to pay the bill.

[FlyersFan]

flyers, tell us how you really feel... lol

lol...you know skins, i just am trying to find the point where it became a bad thing to be successful in life and work hard.

that was just a bad broad based generalization that doesn't fly with me.

[homedawg]

flyers, tell us how you really feel... lol

:thumbs:




Flyers, You are not alone! :beerbang:

[Skinsfan]

flyers, tell us how you really feel... lol

[FlyersFan]

But if we are talking about W2 income, which is what is being raised, you have to admit that executives getting on average 300x the lowest person is an outsized reward for productivity that is probably a.) nowhere near that much higher and b.) is probably more towards the line manager where the action takes place. At the highest corporate level, compensation has much more to do with who you stack on your comp board than your capabilities.

hey fish- i really really really resent you making everyone out to be some corporate lazy clown that does well in life. I started a business from scratch. if you've never done it you won't even have the faintest clue how hard it is. it's the hardest thing you can ever do work wise in life. you put all your eggs in a basket and take more risk than most people ever will in life. i employ people, purchase goods from other vendors etc.......and now i am penalized because my business was successful???....:dunno:

that fking pisses me off to no end when i hear you talk about "outsized rewards" and my blood is boiling as we type this.

you obviously seem to have something against people who do well in life. but go ahead, tax the **** out of me...and then all my workers can say bye bye to their child care, health care, bonuses etc....cause the government is going to have all my money.

dang that pisses me off fish that you lump everyone who does well in life into the category of lazy corporate guy. there are plenty of americans who do very well, never took a thing from anyone and now you want to penalize the entreprenuers in this country that are the life blood of what this country is supposed to be about.....?? :puke: typical fking liberal point of view.....

and who are you to judge whether someone making 400K earns it or not.?? my cousin worked his ASS off to get where he is and he works as hard as anyone and does very very well in a corporate environment.........

[Fish2006]

From an economist's point of view, productivityis the amount of output per unit of input. Basically, GDP divided by employment.... So, in this context, the most productive people can be defined several ways:
A) People who spend lots of money in our economy
B) People who faciliate/produce the products to be consumed

Working the counter at DQ is certainly a HARD job... you're on your feet, etc.... But the most productive person at that DQ is the owner/franchisee who invested the money that allowed for that specific DQ to be built... or the store manager that makes sure the operation is going as smoothly as possible.... or the business manager who finds a way to be more efficient, and increase the revenue stream... they are supplying more to GDP than the poor guy working the counter.....

I agree - it was an error for me to confuse hard work and productivity. You are right, they are not the same thing. You can work very hard digging ditches, but the value of that may or may not be very economic.

Now, that said, lets see who the real benefactors were of the latest runup - the executives in big oil in the last 2 years. They had stock comp that went through the roof as a result of the runup in oil, that even they themselves admit they had almost nothing to do with (and if they did, ha, bad then too). They were lucky, certainly not productive.

Productivity happens with initiative to find efficiency, and the means to execute on that initiative. Investors get capital gains rates that are lower than W2 income rates exactly for that reason, and IMO, thats a good thing.

But if we are talking about W2 income, which is what is being raised, you have to admit that executives getting on average 300x the lowest person is an outsized reward for productivity that is probably a.) nowhere near that much higher and b.) is probably more towards the line manager where the action takes place. At the highest corporate level, compensation has much more to do with who you stack on your comp board than your capabilities. Investors should be rightly pissed that the managers of the companies they own are taking so much out of the enterprises they (us) own.

[Fish2006]

I dont think being productive means you necessarily make a lot of money. Now I can agree that many of the fat cats in Corp america may not be the most productive as with many of the larger US companies the lower level employees do shoulder the load...to that degree you have to start somewhere. I can say that all of the successful individuals I know most making more than $250/yr consitantly, are small business owners working their asses off 50-60 hrs/week supporting employees with excellent benefits and it does not get any easier for them to stay on top year after year, I actually see them working harder year after year side by side with employees to keep their company engins running so they can provide jobs for hard working middle class americans. Many of these individuals are foregoing retirement and salary's during the down times in order to provide said jobs.

But dont most of those business owners take most of their income through S-Corps or LLC/LLP structures and not W2 income? Most small business owners I know actually keep their expenses really low so that they can minimize their W2 income, and operate in the more tax efficient business tax system, which allows for a much higher range of deductions.

And god bless those people who are keeping things going. MY guess is that a lot of people in that situation keep some degree of retained earnings such that they can provide some small measure of job security for the people that work for them. Like I said, I think elimination of corporate taxes, especially on small businesses, would help those folks out a great deal. On that note, from the website:

Support Small Business

• Provide Tax Relief for Small Businesses and Start Up Companies: Barack Obama will eliminate all capital gains taxes on start-up and small businesses to encourage innovation and job creation. Obama will also support small business owners by providing a $500 “Making Work Pay” tax credit to almost every worker in America. Self-employed small business owners pay both the employee and the employer side of the payroll tax, and this measure will reduce the burdens of this double taxation.
• Create a National Network of Public-Private Business Incubators: Barack Obama will support entrepreneurship and spur job growth by creating a national network of public-private business incubators. Business incubators facilitate the critical work of entrepreneurs in creating start-up companies. Obama will invest $250 million per year to increase the number and size of incubators in disadvantaged communities throughout the country.

Now, this isn't perfect, and I would hope that we add corp income taxes to the elimination of capital gains for small businesses, but the proposal actually seems like, at least, a good start.

[Skinsfan]

From an economist's point of view, productivityis the amount of output per unit of input. Basically, GDP divided by employment.... So, in this context, the most productive people can be defined several ways:
A) People who spend lots of money in our economy
B) People who faciliate/produce the products to be consumed

Working the counter at DQ is certainly a HARD job... you're on your feet, etc.... But the most productive person at that DQ is the owner/franchisee who invested the money that allowed for that specific DQ to be built... or the store manager that makes sure the operation is going as smoothly as possible.... or the business manager who finds a way to be more efficient, and increase the revenue stream... they are supplying more to GDP than the poor guy working the counter.....

[BoKnows]

I dont think being productive means you necessarily make a lot of money. Now I can agree that many of the fat cats in Corp america may not be the most productive as with many of the larger US companies the lower level employees do shoulder the load...to that degree you have to start somewhere. I can say that all of the successful individuals I know most making more than $250/yr consitantly, are small business owners working their asses off 50-60 hrs/week supporting employees with excellent benefits and it does not get any easier for them to stay on top year after year, I actually see them working harder year after year side by side with employees to keep their company engins running so they can provide jobs for hard working middle class americans. Many of these individuals are foregoing retirement and salary's during the down times in order to provide said jobs.

[Fish2006]

Why all the hate on the estate tax? The estate tax taxes the least productive Americans - dead ones and ones living off the largesse of another's work. Heck, I like what Warren Buffet and Bill Gates are doing - the kids enough to do most things, but not enough to do nothing (i.e. around $5M), the rest goes to charity.

Now, that said, if you think the most productive Americans are the ones who have the highest incomes, I think you should take a second look. For one, I can state with certainty that the higher you go up in corporate America, the less productive you tend to be. My hardest job I ever worked was doing the counter at a DQ when I was a teenager. Every job I have had since then has been easier and easier, the higher I have gone up the ladder.

The real rich are not that way because of productivity, they are that way because they a.) inherited it (old money) or b.) found a niche, worked hard, and took a risk.

That said, I am in favor of lower capital gains. And I think Obama is mistaken on that front. I never said he was perfect :) I think risk takers need to have a reasonable return on investment. What I don't think is that when they lose the bet, that the government should bail them out.

Obama, as far as I know, is in favor of keeping the cuts for everyone but people making over $250k AGI. And is in favor of removing the FICA cap above that level (or perhaps higher - need to check) - leaving a hole from around 110k to 250k or wherever, which is good, given that the money you make between around 110k and 200k is the highest tax money in the system - as that is where most of the current tax breaks level off and most people get hit with AMT.

As for programs, everyone has their pet programs, and Bush and McCain are no exception. I think it is unfair to just say XX programs == bad without looking at what they are and what might be being eliminated to compensate for them. If it is programs to, say, rebuild broken infrastructure like bridges and stuff, then its probably good. If it is a program that is, say, "free crack for teenagers", then probably not. MY guess is it probably more like the former than the latter.