How do they come up with this stuff? Liberals “hate the rich” Liberals “hate America”. They spent 8 years criticizing Clinton, but they weren’t America haters, THEY were patriotic.
Anyway, to stay on topic, according to these tables put out by the IRS for 1999 ( http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/99in11si.xls ) the statement “the top 10% of earners pay 70% of the taxes” appears to be true. Further, the break-point is probably around 92K/year. If you make 92K/year, you are in the top 10% of earners among all tax return filers.
Now, its true that many liberals has said that Bush’s plan favors the rich. Now who was it who made the intellectual leap that Liberals believe 92K/year are included in the rich. Does anyone know the culprit?
According to line 39 on the above table someone who makes 86K/year will pay about 13.7% in taxes. Now, that doesn’t strike me as being so horribly unfair that we need revolution in the streets.
If anyone wants to know, I consider someone who makes $589,000/year (look at line 104), to be rich. That person’s tax was $156,000. That’s 26.5% to taxes. Gosh, I’m really not all that upset. Actually, I wouldn’t mind seeing that person cough up a bit more if it means the guy who makes $19,500 per year (line 33) gets to save a few hundred bucks off of his $1,500 tax bill.
This is in Great Debates so people with dissenting views can post. However, I would like to know if anyone knows who it was who first claimed “Liberals think that if you make $92,000/year you are rich.”
I don’t think “rich” is an appropriate word, but for many places in America that is a whole lot of money to be making. If I made that, I know I’d feel quite satisfied with my income. Hell, more than satisfied. I would be perfectly happy with 50K a year.
Don’t know the originator, but I’ll give you a liberal’s viewpoint.
The poor view money as for absolute necessities. Food, rent, gas, etc.
The middle class have necessities under control, so they view the additional money as for luxuries. A nice car, an expensive college education, a new house, etc.
The rich, with necessities and luxuries taken care of, view the rest as capital. If you can sink $100,000-$200,000 into starting a business every year and not feel it, you’re rich in my book.
I would say $92,000 is an upper middle class income. It’s about three times the average. You could send a few kids to college on it and still live very comfortably. It’s not enough for capital, though.
Hmmm–unless Bush’s plan has measurres in it that I haven’t heard about which specifically address the “top 10%”, then I can’t see any reason to equate $92K/year with “rich”. It certainly doesn’t jibe with my personal experience. I see lots of rich folk in Palm Beach County, and $92K wouldn’t get you past their gate guards.
If you make 92 thousand dollars a year, I think you are rich.
If you don’t think so, you really have to get a grip on what riches are.
I don’t make half that, and I think I am rich. I think I should pay more in taxes, and more in percentage as well as in dollars, than someone who is making 19 thousand dollars.
I think we live in the safest, most comfortable, most free, most enjoyable society in the history of the world. Of course it’s expensive! It’s supposed to be expensive! It’s wealth beyond the imagination of the kings of old. With ninety thousand dollars a year, if you don’t think you’re wealthy, you can live like an average American for a few years, and then you can invest the sixty thousand dollars you have extra. In about seven years you will be earning twice what you earn now. Is 180 thousand a year rich enough for you? Of course not. Because you can never be rich.
Taxes should be higher for the rich. They can afford it, they get the most benefit from it. But the fact is that everyone in the United States with an above average income is rich. Most of the rest of us are not doing all that bad. The poor shouldn’t have to pay any taxes at all. They’re poor, remember. They ain’t got no money. Not having money is a big problem for them. If you give them a tax break, they spend more. If they spend more, rich people get more.
Is this 92K household income or one individuals income?
Since the liberals are the ones quick to claim that Bush’s tax cut is for “the rich”. I think it would be up to them to define “rich”.
In the area where I live (Boston, MA) 92K of household income is not enough to qualify as rich. That is not enough money to buy a house in this area at all, especially not a nice one. Maybe a condo in a bad neighborhood.
No, you pretty much have to be rich to buy a house (or most condos) in Boston metro (Cambridge especially, Brookline, probably Somerville etc) unless you’re willing to live in high-crime areas. But a married friend of mine just got a house in Salem for 215K… and their income is probably only around 100K (or less) a year. Now, are they rich? Hell no. But I know their finances, and I wish I had them at my disposal. I would feel quite wealthy (re: Tris’s post), though I couldn’t be described as “rich”.
But of course, that’s because I’ve lived for so long without significant income, so anything feels like a lot to me.
I’ve never even heard this statement before. You say it as though it were a phrase in common currency, and you’re just trying to find out who first said. Who’s saying it now? Any links?
I wouldn’t say $92,000 is rich, but it’s darn close. I’d put the threshold between upper-upper middle class and rich at around $120,000. Of course, if you choose to live in a place where property values are truly artificially fantasylandish (All of California, Seattle, Boston, New York, DC, etc), then, well, so be it, and adjust accordingly.
I have friends who live on the DC Marc train line, 1-2 hours from the city. They paid $130,000 for a house that wouldn’t sell for $50,000 in my area. Rich is relative.
Oh, and after looking at that IRS chart, don’t forget that that’s adjusted gross income, so a family filing a $90,000 return may actually make $100,000 - $110,000 or more (after deducting interest on their $500,000 mortgage).
As far as I can tell, the only “culprit” that’s making a leap in logic is you.
Criticizing President Clinton doesn’t make someone an America hater, as you suggest (for that matter, neither does criticizing President Bush).
First of all, I’m unaware of any conservative that has said that $92K per year is “rich.” Can you provide me with a quote or a cite? Unless you can, my answer to your question is “You.”
A couple of other points worth mentioning.
First, your website is only looking at the percentage of income taken through the federal income tax. The total amount of money paid in taxes is much higher. Take a look at this website, which provides figures for the total tax burden on American families, which are quite a bit higher than the numbers you provide.
Similarly, your website does not appear to take into consideration standard and itemized deductions. So a person who earns $19,500 per year would not pay $1500 per year, as you suggest. The standard deduction for a single person in 2001 was $4550, meaning a single person earning $19,500 per year would probably get a return of approximately $3000. (If I’m wrong about this, I’d encourage one of our freakishly smart tax experts to correct me).
Second, why is it necessarily wrong to define $92K per year as “rich?” It’s approximately 3 times the median single-income household’s total earnings. People that earn $92K per year are in the top 10% of the wealthiest Americans. Isn’t that enough?
Third, what’s your point? Even if I agree that $92K per year is not “rich,” I fail to see how that would damage either a liberal or conservative argument.
Fourth, how is “Liberals hate the rich” worse than “Conservatives hate the poor”? As much as I hate this type of hyperbole, I think factions on both sides are guilty of it.
It was cited to me as fact by three different sources (all off-line0 in the past 2 weeks. I assumed some conservate talking head was spouting it.
Deny it if you want, but this is a common thing for conservatives to say. Probably ever since Ann Coulter wrote "“Liberals hate America…Islamic terrorists don’t hate America as much as liberals do,” it has been repeated by commentators hundreds if not thousands of times. A search of the quote “liberals hate America” produced 144 hits in Google. A search of “conservatives hate America” produced 3, all of which referred to the same article.
Yes. I sit at home and make up things to attribute to other people. That is all I do. You found me out.
Well, until the Federal government is able to control what State government’s tax, it is FEDERAL taxes that are have been in the news recently.
[qoute]Similarly, your website does not appear to take into consideration standard and itemized deductions. So a person who earns $19,500 per year would not pay $1500 per year, as you suggest.
[/quote]
That’s not how I read the table. As I read it, it lists AGI and total federal income tax burden. It includes everything.
In the context of the discussions I’ve had on the subject, in between explaining how liberals hate America and how the media is biased to be liberal, it was said that liberals classify the “rich” as $92K and want to tax them out of existance.
A google search of “conservatives hate the poor” and “conservatives hate poor” each produced a single hit. Both of them were conservative pundits who were claiming that liberals made the accusation. Every liberal pundit I have heard who said something about the topic has said something like “Conservative don’t care about the poor.” Indifference is different than hate.
As to the last point, I should say that very few liberal pundits have actually said something like “conservatives don’t care about the poor” My point was merely that the ones who I have heard say something to that effect has put it in terms of indifference.
FWIW, I heard Rush Limbaugh use the argument in question within the past week. No, I can’t find a cite. But I recall discussing the question with a co-worker. I don’t remember if Rush rounded it up to 100K, or if I did in my discussion.
So when I saw this thread, I knew exactly what it was about. I don’t know if anyone beyond Rush is accusing liberals of calling 92K-earners “rich.” But I know he does.
Bah. The archives on the Rush Limbaugh site are all audio clips, so I can’t find an exact quote. There’s some tantalizingly close material there – class warfare, Democrats vs. the rich – but no luck finding the 92,000 figure.
What are the sources? I’m genuinely interested in where this argument is coming from.
You’re doing exactly what you’re trying to criticise. You’re arguing that conservatives shouldn’t make inaccurate generalizations about liberals (“don’t say that liberals hate America”) and at the same time, you’re saying “conservatives commonly make this inaccurate generalization about liberals.” That’s an inaccurate generalization. Some conservatives might occasionally make that inaccurate generalization. But both conservatives and liberals are guilty of that tactic. Using your “Google hits” method for determining how often things are said in political discourse, you should try searching “George Bush is dumb,” “Ann Coulter is a bitch,” or “heartless Republicans.”
Is that what I said? Did I say that you sit at home and make up things to attribute to other people? Or did you just make up that statement and attribute it to me?
You’re mischaracterizing the facts. The conservative argument is that the total tax burden is too high. You’re only pointing to a small portion of that tax burden. I’m just trying to point out that the actual tax picture is very different from what you’re saying.
– Let me interject here that I think I was wrong in my calculation of the taxes to be paid by a person earning $19,500 per year. I think that you figure AGI, and then reduce the AGI by the standard deduction (and credits, etc.), and then apply the tax rate to that figure. And now I should stop talking about this before I really start confusing people (myself included). –
I’d agree that’s a pretty poor argument. As I said, I hate this kind of statement, as it adds nothing substantive to the debate. Plus, the part about wanting to tax the rich out of existence is certainly false. But whether people who make $92K per year are “rich” is irrelevant to that fact (at least I hope it is).
But my questions still remain: why is it necessarily wrong to define people that make $92K per year as “rich”? And if they are wrong, how does it hurt the conservatives’ argument?
A Google search for “Liberals hate the rich” or “Liberals hate rich” each produce a single hit. The first was a liberal pundit who was claiming that a conservative made the accusation. So according to your logic, about the same number of accusations are being made on either side.
Hyperbole is the same as hyperbole. Both statements are equally false, and both statements are equally useless.
TheeGrumpy, thanks for pointing me in the right direction. That sounds like something that Rush would say. He’s big on hyperbole. But whether the line for “rich” falls at $92K, or $920K, is irrelevant. I doubt that anyone (including Rush) actually believes that all liberals want to “tax the rich out of existence.” Besides being politically implausible, it’s also physically impossible.
According to Hannity on tonight’s show, it is household income. Since that is the first time I heard the figure used, I’ll blame him for coming up with it.
My impression is that most of the quotes I have heard from the Dems as regards the distribution of the tax breaks talks about the amount that will go to the top 1%, not the top 10%…although there may have been some discussions of how much goes to the top 10%.
By my definition, top 1% is rich, top 10% is not quite rich (maybe 'cause I am just about there) but it is certainly very well-off and not the sort of people who I think really need their taxes cut right now.
Obviously though, there is no good definition of what “rich” is, which is why it makes sense to define the term when you are talking about specific numbers [e.g., “58% of the tax cuts go to the rich”].
I’d consider 92K to be well off, bordering on downright rich. No households in my family or immediate circle of friends make that much.
For what it’s worth, I make about 12K a year. I spend 6K a year on rent (Pricey area, I live in a shack, can’t move because of school). Yet I buy plenty of fancy food from the corner grocer, have a high-bandwidth Internet connection, live a block from the beach, and go out often-albeit usually to matinee movies and cheap taquerias. This is much greater luxery than I grew up with and honestly there are few things more that I could ask for.
So yeah, 92K looks like a pretty absurdly huge amount of money from this point of view.
