Obama firm: Don't extend tax breaks for wealthiest

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CLEVELAND – President Barack Obama strongly defended his opposition to extending Bush-era tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans on Wednesday and delivered a searing attack on Republicans and their House leader for advocating "the same philosophy that led to this mess in the first place."

Obama said the struggling U.S. economy can't afford to spend $700 billion to keep lower tax rates in place for the nation's highest earners despite a call by House Minority Leader John Boehner and other GOP leaders to do just that.

"Let me be clear to Mr. Boehner and everyone else. We should not hold middle class tax cuts hostage any longer," the president said. The administration "is ready this week to give tax cuts to every American making $250,000 or less," he said.

Actually, Obama and other Democratic leaders want to extend the tax cuts except for individuals making over $200,000 a year — or families earning over $250,000. The sweeping series of Bush tax cuts expires at the end of this year unless Congress renews them.

I know Obama has been talking about this subject for awhile now, but it looks like there may be a possibility, this week if he goes through with it, that American families earning under $250,000 a year will get tax break. In my opinion, I do think this sounds like a good idea, but I will have to see how everything goes after.

Imagine that. Someone in a higher up position actually doing something smart for a change.
Is it just me or is that what we should have been doing all along?

MOTF!

It is pretty suprising. I wonder if theres going to be any strings attatched? Im guessing theres something behind the scenes that we havent been told yet.

Well of course they shouldn't get a Tax Break now, considering they got their Tax Breaks earlier in the form of the $700 Billion Stimulus Package. Don't want them double-dipping, do we?

It's long overdue that we abandon the Voodoo Economics of the Reagan era and realize that our economy, unlike water, is based on Trickle-Up, not Trickle-Down.

Heck, $5000 wouldn't even buy the mistress of the Upper Class a handbag. That money doesn't get spent, it doesn't get circulated, yet $5000 to the lowest 1% would be spent and circulated in one day (even if it is a 500,000% increase to their current income)! You will have successfully jump-started the economy by inverting those Tax Breaks or Stimulus Packages!

I don't cheer on Obama often, but he might finally have bought himself a clue. I'm just hoping it's not all polished rhetoric that will be followed by him signing a Bill into Law that will do the opposite and extend Tax Breaks to the upper 1% uber-rich.

To extend, or not to extend, doesn't really matter, ... but if taxes go up for everyone (which they will) it's the end of Obama and he will no longer be able to get away with blaming Bush for everything he can't fix.

I'm not defending the big corporations, BUT:
* In the wild, when the king of the jungle makes a big game kill, all the smaller animals benefit.
* I don't know of anyone that has ever worked for a poor person.

People need to think logically, not emotionally.

Hold your nose for a second and imagine that you are a wealthy person.

Imagine that you have been investing in some corporation that makes shoes or tractors or something. And they pay a dividend of 7%.

Now suppose that you have just learnt that the president plans to increase your taxes by 7%.

You could invest the money; but then, if the market goes down, you could lose everything. Even if it pays 7% again this year, you'll still have to pay all of that money (which was your reward for risking your capital in the market in the first place) over to the IRS.

Or, you could just buy a treasury bill. Sure, you'd get only 2%. But it is guaranteed, and tax free!

So knowing all this, what will the average rich person do? Why, they'll take all their money out of investments and put it in bonds and t-bills, thus avoiding all tax (adding to the deficit) and shrinking the economy. They won't spend it, they won't invest it. They'll just lock it up in long-bonds from the mid 1990's, which still have a good yield (often 4-6%), and add NOTHING to the economy.

Expect in 2012 to hear that the economy has (gasp!) actually shrunk....

only, it appears to me, they haven't been investing in corporations.....
they've been investing in little pieces of paper, betting on weather the value of that paper is going to go up or down. that paper might represent a share of or the stock a corp has issued, it might represent our debt, some silver or gold...ect...
heck, they don't even have to own the piece of paper to play the game!!! and they can make just as much money destroying a corp than they do investing long term and hoping the corp succeeds and flourishes.

by the way, most of us don't work for the corps, and our companies don't have the backing of any big time investors....
by bosses aren't rich, are yours??