Comparing Tax cuts. Bush vs Gore

[Mr.Zambezi]

…the EITC phases out for this mother at 21.06%. What does that mean? That means for each additional dollar she earns, she loses 21.06¢ of her EITC. Let’s add 15 and 21.06, and what do we get

nice try. Not getting paid extra is not the same as being taxed more.

Using your logic, I would be doing better off on welfare than making 100 grand. On welfare I am getting, say $500 a month. i get a job making 10,000 per month. My benefit goes to zero. as a percentage of my income, my rate goees from negative 100% to +36%!

One needs to look at what one is actually taking home.

[johnson]

I disagree, Mr. Zambezi (odd, because I agree with most of what you’ve said in this thread). I’m not talking about welfare, I’m talking about a component of the income tax structure which is directly tied to income. And I am discussing what people actually take home (you can get advance payments on your EITC, so it’s not even something that you have to wait until April 15 for). I’m not arguing that someone is better off or worse off in toto.

It is an incontrovertible fact that if this individual earns $1 more, they will lose 36¢ to the federal government because of income tax laws. The effective marginal rate is 36% (disregarding social security, of course)–to the extent that marginal tax rates are disincentives, it has to apply here as well. And, to the extent that they are disincentives, wouldn’t you imagine a 36% marginal rate is much more of a disincentive to someone earning $18,000 or so than to someone earning $250,000?

[Phil_15]

Kimstu said:

the EITC seems to be quite effective in that way too)

Sorry, but how can you back up that statement? What percentage use that money for schooling, daycare as opposesed to selfdestructive purposes? It is a handout that we have NO control over the outcome or effective use of the money.

Our only disagreement might be that I would be in favor of spending the small amount of money it would take to provide bare subsistence to even the incorrigible “dregs”, who are quite a small fraction of the poor population, whereas you might say that we should take no action at all in their case. As I say, this is really minor compared to the issue of what we should do about most poor people. What’s to argue?

Note “my” use of emphsis above. What is small? What is minor? I do not want my money wasted regardless of the amount. It is being thrown away by the feds who do not have the ability to manage at such a micro level. And that is better left up to state and local charities IMHO!!

As for raising the minimum wage to a living-wage level, I quite agree that that could be economically tricky (although the cities such as Baltimore that have enacted living-wage
ordinances haven’t had financial problems with it

Local level changes are OK. They have control over what may work for them. I oppose the feds from doing this because what works in Baltimore may prove to be a disaster in Atlanta. Keep the damn feds from mandating!!!

Therefore, if we don’t want to mandate that working people must be paid a living wage, and we want working people to have enough to live on, then we’re back to facing the ssue of what kind of incentives and assistance we should provide for them. About which, as I said, we don’t seem to be in substantial disagreement.

Yes, we are I’m like the army…I want people to be all they can be. I am willing to offer help to those who are ambitious enough to use it. Screw the rest of them at least as far as direct federal aid goes. These kind of problems will never disappear and if they are to be addressed at all it should be by the local charities and organizations,(which if the feds took their grimy hands out of my pockets, I could (and WOULD) more easily support). The liberal position IMHO tends to move money from the local level to be dispensed at the grossly ineffecient and wasteful federal level.

[Danielinthewolvesden]

Well, Johnson, in that case you would have to start figuring in the phase/out of the exemptions, std deduction, misc itemized deduction, and other such that the folks in the 39.6% bracket also pay, which makes their marginal EFFECTIVE tax rates more like 45%+, not to mention the alt min tax, etc. So, these folks pay a much higher marginal “effective” tax rate. And this is certainly a “disencentive” to those multi-millionaires, etc. I notice that Ellison & Gates really don’t seem to care much anymore about earning money as their tax rates are a “disencentive”. WRONG. :rolleyes:

Sorry for being a bit firm with you back there, but if you had said “effective” tax rate, I would have any given you “just” a “wrong”.

[system]

*Originally posted by Phil_15 *
**Kimstu said:The liberal position IMHO tends to move money from the local level to be dispensed at the grossly ineffecient and wasteful federal level. **

I’m quite interested, after reading commentary here and in other threads the factual bases (good comparative data hopefully) upon which posters are basing their opinions about the relative efficiencies of various levels of government.

[Kimstu]

Collounsbury catastrophically misrepresented my views when s/he accidentally posted the following incorrect attribution:

Originally posted by Phil_15:
Kimstu said:The liberal position IMHO tends to move money from the local level to be dispensed at the grossly ineffecient [sic] and wasteful federal level.

Kimstu, of course, said NO SUCH THING; it was Phil_15 himself who made that remark. And I completely stand with Collounsbury in requesting Phil to provide some references for his assessment of the different levels of efficiency and waste at different levels of government.

(And Phil, as for the effectiveness of the EITC in providing incentives to work, I refer you to the cites I gave for that on the previous page of this thread.)

[system]

My humble apologies all, it was bad snippage in a hurry. However, my question is actually quite general, for liberal and conservative, neutral and partisan.

I find a lot of generalizations are slung around here (by both sides) and given my penchant for analysis, I was wondering if these maxims (of government efficiency or non-efficiency) derive from anything but anectdotal observation. If so, I am disappointed, as we all know --I hope-- the problem of selection bias

*Originally posted by Kimstu *
**Collounsbury catastrophically misrepresented my views when s/he accidentally posted the following incorrect attribution:

Originally posted by Phil_15:
Kimstu said:The liberal position IMHO tends to move money from the local level to be dispensed at the grossly ineffecient [sic] and wasteful federal level.

Kimstu, of course, said NO SUCH THING; it was Phil_15 himself who made that remark. And I completely stand with Collounsbury in requesting Phil to provide some references for his assessment of the different levels of efficiency and waste at different levels of government.

(And Phil, as for the effectiveness of the EITC in providing incentives to work, I refer you to the cites I gave for that on the previous page of this thread.) **

[Phil_15]

Collounsbury
Sorry but I was referring to the recent admissions from the GAO regarding missing millions from several gov. departments including Education. The auditors said that trying to balance was impossible given the state of the current accounts. I am on the road and online time is by the minute so cannot do the research till the weekend My apologies.

Kimstu, I burned some time trying to locate the “link/cite” you referred to. The only one I notced from the last page was “dead”. It merely took me to the message board home

[system]

*Originally posted by Phil_15 *
Collounsbury
Sorry but I was referring to the recent admissions from the GAO regarding missing millions from several gov. departments including Education. The auditors said that trying to balance was impossible given the state of the current accounts. I am on the road and online time is by the minute so cannot do the research till the weekend My apologies.

I understand very well, I am not at home either. Travel, travel. However, my question is about comparisions between different levels of government. One hears assertions about the relative efficiency of level X vs level Y (in both directions) but I can not recall anything concrete. A well designed set of studies would be nice to find.

[Kimstu]

Apologies for the broken link, Phil (though it worked fine last week — ??); the report I was citing is

http://www.cbpp.org/311eitc.htm