Of course they don’t…just ask them and/or their accountants. There are rich people right now that are paying less in taxes to the federal govt. than their own low-level employees!

“What is the point of this particular website?”

It’s to shill for the corporate, big money interests of the Right-wing of the GOP.

“As for consumption taxes being regressive, that implies the poor would pay more, or at least a larger percentage, than the wealthy.”

Have you run the numbers for different income catagories? I have, and the rich get off scott-free, period.

As for MISTER GUY’s arguments that undocumented workers pay payroll taxes, I feel that a large percentage of those work for cash and pay no payroll taxes. That being said, there are pretty substantial numbers of legal Americans who work for cash so the Fair Tax would address both of those groups completely fairly and objectively.

As for consumption taxes being regressive, that implies the poor would pay more, or at least a larger percentage, than the wealthy. Have you read the Fair Tax book? It seems pretty laid out in simple black and white that this simply isn’t the case. If you have 100 years of evidence to the contrary, point me in that direction for enlightenment because I don’t see it.

My point is not to be confrontational here. I do have significant disagreements with the current tax system. I do NOT know the perfect solution. I am quite open to alternatives. For now, the Fair Tax is HANDS DOWN, the best option I’ve seen.

Try again…the rest of your argument has been had and lost like a hundred years ago now. Consumption taxes are regressive taxes, period.

“It would also force travelers, tourists, and illegals or ‘undocumented’ people to pay taxes on each purchase.”

This already happens now…they pay sales taxes and/or payroll taxes.

“I don’t want to pay a ridiculous amount of taxes!”

Join the club, but the rich can well afford to pay their fair share of taxes.

The class warfare deal is a serious problem. The truth here is that no one argues whether or not the top percentages of wealthy Americans pay their share of taxes. They do. I notice that Sickle and some of the others are quick to point out a lack of “links” or other support for charts and numbers but they offer no figures or support for their own. THERE IS NO WEBSITE that doesn’t have its own agenda. Period. We are being divided in order to be conquered. I work for a small family company that employs less than a dozen people. The taxes they pay are astronomical! They cannot expand due to tax constraints. They cannot hire more workers or purchase more equipment due to taxes. They pay more than $20,000 per month in payroll taxes and half that again to accountants and bookkeepers. The current system is broken but the powers that be pit people against each other based on their bank account and sit back and continue to operate a broken system.

I am not in the top income brackets but I would like to be some day. And when I get there, I don’t want to pay a ridiculous amount of taxes! Class warfare is a horrible tactic but apparently quite effective.

A thing that has always bothered me about these discussions is the percentage of taxes paid by high income people, as in the NTU chart above.

First, why do these charts never have Gross Income instead of Adjusted Gross Income? I don’t know many $30,000 a year workers maxing out their IRAs, do you? Or maxing out their HSA’s?

I say this only because it’s a little unsettling to see us responded to as straw men, instead of as normal people making very real policy points.

This is a load of bunk, and it’s a shame that you don’t know it. Ever hear of corporate welfare, tax give-aways to Big Oil and the like, etc., etc.?

“how about a flat or fair tax?”

Do the math on it…it’s a great deal for the rich and a crappy deal for the poor, period. They even have a calculator for their tax scheme on this website…check it out and run some numbers.

“And what is the moral grounds for punishing success anyway?”

Sounds like you don’t believe either in basing taxes on one’s ability to pay…that’s fine…some of us just disagree is all.

I meant 1984…the book by Orwell. Sounds like you were raised right to me Leo.

“in the US economy, small companies (like mine) employ more than 90% of the workers in the US, and without hard data, we are the ones that are actually moving this economy as oppose to mega corporations, or speculative hedge funds.”

I agree completely.

I forgot to address an interesting point Rich is trying to make about the very rich (no pun intended seriously). It seems that be a meme, or some sort of cultural thing in the US to consider capital owners as a different breed of humans, which they are not.

Go to Brendan Steinhauser’s MySpace page (just search for his name) and you’ll see his favorite books are heavy on Ayn Rand. I read “Atlas Shrugs” and “Fountainhead” in High School like everyone else and of course believed I was one of Rand’s chosen, special people, just like everybody else who reads her. Of course, I got older and realized how silly that all was (again, like most folks), but others like the folks here have bought all that stuff hook, line, and sinker.

In short, they really do believe that capital owners are a different breed of humans and that it is their (divine?) right to do whatever is good for them at the expense of other, lesser people.

What strikes me is how these guys have duped their “grassroots” into voting against their interest, using the very people they scapegoat and despise to pass their agenda. I doubt their “activists” know that their contributions are going to paying Dick Armey’s half-a-million dollar annual salary from Freedomworks (for well under 40-hours of work, check out their latest 990s).

In fact I would argue that professionals (like Doctors, Lawyers, Architecs, Engineers) contribute more to society as a whole than rich capital owners. However those professionals are the ones that are carrying the tax burden right now in comparison to other high income earners (like hedge fund managers).

My counterpoint to Rich’s is that in the US economy, small companies (like mine) employ more than 90% of the workers in the US, and without hard data, we are the ones that are actually moving this economy as oppose to mega corporations, or speculative hedge funds.

The whole super rich thing is just a myth, the US economy is driven by 70% internal consuptiom (done by normal people, mostly middle class). And we, the small business owners, provide jobs for 90% of them.

Also it is a fallacy that goverments must reward risk takers, there is nothing worthy about taking risks, in fact any idiot can do it (just look at the subprime market mess). The rewards or punishments of risk taking should be left to market forces. The important thing is to tax income from any source the same way, be it manual labor, intelectual one, or just dividends or capital gains. All at the end is the same money, and should be taxed in a consistent manner.

My grief with the 10 million and up bracket is that they are having a field day with taxes because their capital gains are taxed at 15% flat. I fail to see any reason why, unless we buy into the whole “capital gains are for especial people and they deserve rewards” philosophy, which is clearly false.

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/07infallbulreturns.pdf

With regard to fairness and 1984 concepts, I might agree about how relative or outdate they can be. But beyond the philosophical issues, there is an objective one. Any change that benefits a small percentage of tax payers in detriment of a huge number of them is plainly wrong and misguided.

For whatever reason, be it hard work, or just being lucky at birth, some of us are in the upper middle class or higher brackets and even with our tax burden we have it way too easy compared with a vast majority of americans, let alone with the rest of the world. This discussion about lowering taxes, at least in my personal view, comes down to a matter of pure greed. I think that an effective tax rate around 25% is manageable for people like me. Of course I would take a nice tax cut anytime you want, but not at the expense of others that have a harder time than me, call me stupid or idealistic, but that is the way I was raised.