Never interrupt your enemy when he’s busy making a mistake.
Sure, some. But this thread is about the federal income tax code.
Paying sales tax at the Walmart doesn’t make one a citizen, or “the government.”
Given that corporations and wealthy individuals hide their money offshore to avoid paying some or all federal taxes, are they, by your own reasoning, not citizens?
That’s a hell of a cliff you’ve introduced there.
By my calculation, using 2017 tax brackets, a single person with taxable income of $124,999 would pay $16,052 (((1249990.65)-37,950).25 + 5,226.25), and a person with taxable income of $125,000 would pay $27,981.
Congratulations, you got a small raise! Now you owe an extra $11,000 in taxes!
This is, frankly, a bafflingly weird and behavior-distorting way to make income taxes more progressive, especially since we already have the concept of tax brackets, which are progressive without weird discontinuities.
How sure are you of that?
How about we have a Republican tax plan? The one we had under Eisenhower? ISTM that if the choice is ‘use it or lose it’, people and companies will invest in America instead of sitting on their offshore hoards like Smaug.
You know. Deplorables.
Citizens was a poor word choice on my part. I was responding to the person who said that “taxpayers are the government.”
If one doesn’t pay federal income taxes, is he “the government?”
I suppose “keep things the same” is a plan of sorts. It’s a shame though, because I think we probably could simplify the code (assuming that’s a goal) without horribly sticking it to anyone.
But of course I don’t have a plan either. I suppose I could spout off nonsense proposals, as has already been done in this thread.
As has already been brought to your attention, the “taxpayers” comprises more than just those who are currently paying federal income tax.
Right, the government is just the system We the People use to get things done on a broad scale. It isn’t (supposed to be) a machine into which you insert money and receive favors. I’m constantly amazed at the number of people who think of it is a kind of alien occupying power that must be resisted.
Yes, and guilty as charged.
Paying sales tax does not make someone a taxpayer?
But we’re talking about the federal income tax code. How exactly are those that pay none “the government”?
Citizens are the government. Taxpayers are a subset.
Taxpayers are a superset.
How many taxpayers can dance on the head of a pin?
Which covers only a subset of taxpayers.
Look, I don’t think tax cuts are a handout either. I could be deliberately obtuse about who is or is not a taxpayer, but that is only a good strategy for liberals pretending to be conservatives in order to make conservatives look bad.
Coming back to the OP, does anyone recall any recent calls for tax changes by dems? I’m sure it came up during the last election but I’m not coming across anything comprehensive.
One specific example is that every Obama budget included a proposal to close corporate tax loopholes that do silly things like make it easier to send jobs overseas. These proposals were opposed by Republicans.
Here’s is Hillary on Taxes (2015/16, except as noted). An except:
50% from estates over 1 million. Assets like trust funds become associated with their owners. The primary method used to do all this would be a census like effort of all assets with in the United States.
https://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/17/measuring-the-top-1-by-wealth-not-income/
This also applies to foreign holders of American assets. But even ignoring them, since all these 1 million+ estates are for the top 1%, and they own 1/3 of everything, since America has 120 trillion net dollars, 120 trillion * 1/3 * 0.5 = 20 trillion.
Ultimately, over about 30-50 years, the Federal government would now have assets roughly equal to the national debt. Books balanced.