The tax system in this country baffles me, truly.

Corporations pay about 200 billion a year, give or take, on their earnings.

Taxpayers meanwhile pay somewhere in the neighborhood of 900 billion to keep the country running, and that's just from income tax.

The facts are clear, the individual is an endangered species, being pushed to the limits of the window of survivability by corporate predators.

I think what we all want, and need, is simple self sufficiency. The rest is simple greed, base and not very inspirational. We just need enough to survive, but that's asking too much.

The ship of state is being piloted by remote, it's under the control of a bunch of oligarchs in far away distant lands. They don't care if the ship crashes, they have a thousand or so others to choose from in that situation. In fact, when a nation crashes and burns, there is a great deal of profit to be made by those who know the ropes. They don't care if they run us aground, it's all just business to them.

So what are you going to do about it? Complain and moan or actually stop paying your taxes?

The tax system in this country baffles me, truly.

Corporations pay about 200 billion a year, give or take, on their earnings.

Taxpayers meanwhile pay somewhere in the neighborhood of 900 billion to keep the country running, and that's just from income tax.

The facts are clear, the individual is an endangered species, being pushed to the limits of the window of survivability by corporate predators.

It is a mistake to believe that corporations represent some kind of independent source of wealth, just waiting to be tapped for tax revenue so that citizens can pay less. This is a favourite myth of the left.

The truth is, it takes a certain sum of money to run the government, and that money comes out of the economy. If you tax corporations more, they raise their prices in order to maintain the rate of return they need to justify their capital investment.

The only way to reduce taxes is to reduce government spending. Raising corporate taxes only means the government is adding it to the cost of your purchases instead of deducting it from your paycheck.

Originally posted by AlexofSkye

The tax system in this country baffles me, truly.

Corporations pay about 200 billion a year, give or take, on their earnings.

Taxpayers meanwhile pay somewhere in the neighborhood of 900 billion to keep the country running, and that's just from income tax.

The facts are clear, the individual is an endangered species, being pushed to the limits of the window of survivability by corporate predators.

It is a mistake to believe that corporations represent some kind of independent source of wealth, just waiting to be tapped for tax revenue so that citizens can pay less. This is a favourite myth of the left.

The truth is, it takes a certain sum of money to run the government, and that money comes out of the economy. If you tax corporations more, they raise their prices in order to maintain the rate of return they need to justify their capital investment.

The only way to reduce taxes is to reduce government spending. Raising corporate taxes only means the government is adding it to the cost of your purchases instead of deducting it from your paycheck.

There is no doubt two sides to the balance sheet. I guess though before you can really take into account what you are stating you have to know both sides, that is the amount of revenue from the corperations in the way of taxes of both the company and it's slaves, err, employee's. Then you'd have to figure out how much that corperation cost them, in terms of corperate welfare, maintenance, subsidies, waste, pollution, etc. It is only then do you have an accurate picture. IMO, there is no corperation alive today that would show to be benificial to humanity if all issues were considered.

Big corperations are notioursly slow moving, unresponsive and generally horrible to their environment. The only advantage in a market sense that being large has is that it, by way of sheer size, effect pressures on the government to allow laws that are benificial to a certain way of doing things.

In a truly free market large corperations simply wouldn't exist for very long.

Passer by
I don't pay taxes. I endeavor to earn less than the minimum to file every year.

Alex
I believe there needs to be a discussion about acceptable profit margins. What you're saying may be true, but it's unacceptable. It's nothing less than the corporate control of government through economic blackmail. They are allowed the excuse that they need to keep making the same obscene amount of money, when in fact they only want to keep making that obscene amount of money, there is no need. I think there are certain levels most people would be comfortable with..but that's nuts and bolts stuff.

The distillation of the argument is that corporations should not gain perks like billion dollar tax breaks when the average joe is struggling to maintain his mortage. It just doesn't make sense from an economic standpoint. Wealth doesn't migrate down, it doesn't trickle. It slowly travels up, like kerosene in a wick.

The economy should reflect that, by increasing wages, increasing the tax burden of corporations, and removing the immunity these behemoths have to prosecution. They're above the law in the sense that they have all the rights of an individual, and none of the legal responsibilities.

It's a very large double standard in my eyes.

There is a reason it looks like corporations don't pay taxes.

Most corporations are small enough to file as S corps which means that the taxes owed are passed down to the shareholders.

Those shareholders in turn claim their share of profits or losses on their personal returns.

While the company I started may pay no taxes, I assure you I pay them for it.

The econnomy onlly helps the rich to be richer not for the poor or middle class people

Originally posted by eazy_mas
The econnomy onlly helps the rich to be richer not for the poor or middle class people

That would be because the vast majority of the poor and middle class have the mindset that they will only survive if they work FOR someone else. They have no chance of becoming rich unless they hit the lottery.

Could Joe the janitor who cleans the office become a millionare highly unlikely because he is trading the hours of his life for money, he only has 24 hours per day and therefore can only make so much money.

Now lets say Joe through his experience as a janitor develops a remarkable cleaning product, he decides to start his own business marketing this product. Guess what he has just put himself into a position to possibly become rich. He has created new jobs and should be allowed to reap the rewards from his endeavors because he is the one who put himself on the line to start out on his own.

The sad part of the story is that it seems like the vast majority of people have resigned themselves to working for someone else. They grow up thinking "I'll get a decent education and when I grow up I'll get a nice safe job working for someone else where I can get a guaranteed paycheck and have little risk to my life."

Most people want to be rich, but other than buying a lottery ticket every week they don't do much to put themselves in the position to become rich, they continue to go to work for their employer and turn in their 8 hours a day and get their paycheck at the end of the week.

Originally posted by Skibum

Originally posted by eazy_mas
The econnomy onlly helps the rich to be richer not for the poor or middle class people

That would be because the vast majority of the poor and middle class have the mindset that they will only survive if they work FOR someone else. They have no chance of becoming rich unless they hit the lottery.

Could Joe the janitor who cleans the office become a millionare highly unlikely because he is trading the hours of his life for money, he only has 24 hours per day and therefore can only make so much money.

Now lets say Joe through his experience as a janitor develops a remarkable cleaning product, he decides to start his own business marketing this product. Guess what he has just put himself into a position to possibly become rich. He has created new jobs and should be allowed to reap the rewards from his endeavors because he is the one who put himself on the line to start out on his own.

The sad part of the story is that it seems like the vast majority of people have resigned themselves to working for someone else. They grow up thinking "I'll get a decent education and when I grow up I'll get a nice safe job working for someone else where I can get a guaranteed paycheck and have little risk to my life."

Most people want to be rich, but other than buying a lottery ticket every week they don't do much to put themselves in the position to become rich, they continue to go to work for their employer and turn in their 8 hours a day and get their paycheck at the end of the week.

usually for those people ( middle class and poor ) they cant have a limit in reaching something because usually if you have and idea and want to you use it onther guy with much power and money than you will take your idea and use it for his use.

Most of these business peopl like Bill Gates and other Celeb give out money for there publicity and states not because they love world peace.

Money has the power to own something if you give this power to someone else in a way he could develop it in his own good and the people then its like ripping of yous.

usually for those people ( middle class and poor ) they cant have a limit in reaching something because usually if you have and idea and want to you use it onther guy with much power and money than you will take your idea and use it for his use.

Thats what patents, copyrights and trademarks are for.


Funny you mentioned Bill Gates because IIRC he didn't start off being the richest person in the world. Imagine if he had resigned himself to finishing college and going on to work for someone else. Instead he had the guts to drop out and persue his own wealth.

[edit on 6/6/05 by Skibum]

Flat tax!!!! On ALL income, including interest. Same for everybody, no tax breaks on anykind.

No other way to do it.

I am perplexed we as voters and TAX PAYERS have tolerated anything else all these years.

Why should somebody earning triple my income pay a different % on thier taxes? One reason: We the sheeple have alowed it to happen.

FLAT TAX!!! And no breaks or incentives...EVER.

Originally posted by skippytjc
Flat tax!!!! On ALL income, including interest. Same for everybody, no tax breaks on anykind.

No other way to do it.

I am perplexed we as voters and TAX PAYERS have tolerated anything else all these years.

Why should somebody earning triple my income pay a different % on thier taxes? One reason: We the sheeple have alowed it to happen.

FLAT TAX!!! And no breaks or incentives...EVER.

Absolutely, lets raise the taxes on the poor and lower them on the rich.

Originally posted by Skibum

Absolutely, lets raise the taxes on the poor and lower them on the rich.

You read the story posted here at all? Read just a little bit of it? The rich get more breaks than the non rich. If taxes are derived from a percentage, a flat percentage, people will pay relative to thier income. Flat tax is the only way to go. The extreme rich would pay out thier noses with a flat tax.

How do the extereme rich make a good deal of thier money? INTEREST. Well, guess where they get the most breaks on taxes? INTEREST. Tax that interest based on the same rules regular income is, and the playing field is nice and level.

Flat tax, its the only way.


As it stands right now, the middle class gets the shaft. The rich get all the breaks, but the middle class makes to much to take advantage of any lower income breaks and programs.

[edit on 6-6-2005 by skippytjc]

What percentage do you propose? 10 %, 20 %?


Remember we are talking about actual taxes paid, not how much of a break from deductions people get.

As it stands now people below 30k on average pay 6.7 percent of their income(that includes S.S. and medicare not counting those they average almost nothing)

People who make over 100k average over 20% actually paid.


So what flat tax rate do you propose that would not lower the burden on the rich and raise it on the poor?

How much? Id say a decent percentage. But an entire tax system overhaul would need to accompany a switch to flat tax, so its not that simple as "how much".

Ill open a can of worms with this one I am sure: I don’t think you should be able to claim more than 2 dependants either. Paying LESS taxes for having more than two kids is insane. More people = more taxes required...So why pay less money for them? people who want a bunch of kids need to be able to pay the costs associated with them, not get discounts.

I think overall, your total taxes (all taxes) including state or regional taxes shouldn’t be more than 30-35% your income combined. But, whatever it is, it needs to be the same for everybody.

How much? Id say a decent percentage.

So what would a decent percentage be that would not burden the poor while not benefiting the rich?

But an entire tax system overhaul would need to accompany a switch to flat tax, so its not that simple as "how much".

Yes it is that simple, it means scrapping the current tax code and saying that everyone pays X% of their income to taxes. Thats how I see flat tax.
The question is what percentage does everyone pay.

I think overall, your total taxes (all taxes) including state or regional taxes shouldn’t be more than 30-35% your income combined. But, whatever it is, it needs to be the same for everybody.

I think a total tax burden of 30-35 percent on everyone would be way too much, you would be giving the government MUCH more than they get now.

It amazes me how no one questions the patriotism of big companies, like Hilliburton or Enron, who make huge profits in the US, and set up P.O. boxes in places Bermuda or the Cayman Islands, to avoid paying little or no taxes. I mean, if you make billions off of a country, your country, it'd be nice to put some of that money back, into things like roads or the military.