Warren Buffet has been in the news recently, advocating higher tax rates for high earners such as himself. Some of his detractors have noted, quite correctly, that he can send more money to the treasury any time he wants to; he need not wait for his 1040 form to demand more from him.
Factual question: has someone directly asked Mr. Buffett why he doesn’t voluntarily pay more in taxes right now, and if so, what was his response?
What I’d say:
"Do you think that the government would function effectively if all taxes were completely voluntary? We’d be lucky to get a billion dollars a year in budget. Good luck paying the soldiers.
Now that we agree that completely voluntary contributions would not work, we’re only arguing details of how we should tax people."
Even with his fabulous wealth, paying more taxes (such as rolling back the bush tax cuts) for 1 person wouldn’t make any difference at all in the debt.
What he (and others) are advocating is increasing the tax rate on his entire demographic cohort. Even that won’t raise a tremendous amount of money, but we would at least notice it…
It is unfair to ask for 1 person to pay above that of their demographic cohort. It is fair to advocate for altering the rate on an entire demographic cohort (especially if it is your own…)
His point was not that he could send more taxes - his point was that all rich people in general pay a much lower tax rate and percentage of taxes than middle and lower income people, yet reap much higher benefit from society. (Educated servants, police system that ensurs they don’t need an army of security guards everywhere, air traffic control for their private jets, etc.) His point was that maybe everyone should pay their fair share. What that is is GD territory.
In fact, IIRC Warren B has been quite prominent with Bill Gates in donating huge chunks of his money to various charity initiatives to help the world -same thing only different, I guess.
I wish you’d asked this question in BBQ Pit so we could give it the answer it deserves. Instead I’ll ask OP to answer this thought experiment:
Lawrence J. Dolan, owner of the Cleveland Indians, states he preferred baseball without the Designated Hitter rule. Some of his detractors have noted, quite correctly, that he can abstain from exploiting the rule, letting the pitcher bat for himself in every game. Factual question: has someone directly asked Mr. Dolan why he doesn’t voluntarily make the pitcher bat right now, and if so, what was his response?
Buffet is free to send in more money, but his point isn’t that he’s not taxed enough, but that everyone at his income level is not taxed enough. He can fix the inequality in his own business, but that doesn’t change the fact that others at his income level are paying a lower percentage than their employees, and that won’t change until the law is changed.
Although those donations (and those contemplated in his will) do have the effect of reducing his tax liability.
Why wasn’t Dick Cheney personally patrolling the streets of Fallujah?
Wanting to pay more taxes myself and wanting the government to raise tax rates on a group of people that includes myself are 2 separate things.
This is seriously what Americans think about?
:rolleyes:
This is what GQ has come to.
How much did Mr. Buffett pay in taxes? Do you know? He said that his income group’s rate is too low and that his effective tax rate is lower than his secretary’s. Do we know for sure if he paid exactly what was owed?
We know the exact figures. He paid 19% of his income last year. For him to pay the same 29% as his secretary would have him pay $5.5 million more.
Also note that Warren Buffet’s comments were not made out of the blue. He was responding to claims made that high-income people pay more taxes as a percentage of income than low-income people with, “that’s not true, for example, I pay a lower tax rate than my secretary”.
A convincing counter-rebuttal would probably be along the lines of, “You, Mr. Buffet, are an exception because…” followed by some good reason why Mr. Buffet’s situation is atypical.
What I’d say in response: That’s not what I asked. I asked why you, personally, don’t pay more taxes than you owe. Why don’t you?
A&A
The question is quite silly and pointless, yet the dregs that inhabit the letters to the editor section of your local paper think it’s the Ace of Trumps. Yes, I think taxes should be raised, too. No, I don’t make a voluntary contribution. Why not? Because it won’t mean squat. My entire bracket can afford to pay more, and those that make 6 figures (I don’t) can jolly well afford to pay more, and those that make 7+ figures can triple what they currently pay. Any one of us can volunteer to pay more, but it would be like taking an eyedropper full of water out of the ocean. What we need is to raise taxes, raise them now, and raise them on the upper middle class and above.
Because that’s not a public policy question, and the tax rate is a public policy debate.
Mr. Buffett’s personal budget after he has met his legally required obligations.
The government’s taxation policy in a democratic society.
#1 is not a public policy debate because all parties agree that only Mr. Buffett has the right to make decisions regarding it.
#2 is a public policy debate because all parties in a democracy should have a say in how the government sets taxation policy.
Attempting to switch the debate from #2 to #1 does not resolve the question of what #2 should be. In other words, even if Mr. Buffett is the worst hypocrite in the world, he might still be right about public taxation policy. Switching the debate from being about what the government should do, to what Mr. Buffett personally should do changes the nature of the debate from the merits and deficiencies of policy we should all be considering and influencing to one that we have can consider in a salacious, vicarious manner, but that we have no influence on.
Some would say that if Mr. Buffett brings up his own tax rate, it’s fair game to criticize him, but that does not magically transform a debate about Mr. Buffett’s legal obligations into a debate about Mr. Buffett’s voluntary obligations. The whole point behind the debate in the first place is what should tax law be? We’re not having a debate on what donations to the government should look like, because everyone agrees that the government should get by on what it collects in taxes, not what people donate to it.
As a matter of fact, Buffett said he paid about $7 million in taxes, but that his percentage was lower than that of any other person in his office. I could say a lot more if this were in IMHO.
The OP asked a simple question, which has a factual answer. I’m not sure why you feel the need to redirect the question into something else. He didn’t ask what the tax rate is or should be. He didn’t ask a public policy question. If wanted to discuss public policy, he would presumably have opened a thread in GD.
Has anyone asked WB the question, and if so, what was his response?
It’s as simple as that.
Your question, John Mace, was in response to Ludovic’s post #2 in this thread, mine is in response to your post #13.
Why are you allowed to respond to posts after the OP and I am only to respond to the OP?
I don’t know for sure, but I suppose nobody has asked him that question because it’s insanely stupid.