Progressive idea 80% tax - income over $500K doesn't go far enough to fix income inequality

originally posted by: AlaskanDad

If you can suggest a better way to stop the needed currency from being accumulated by the few, I would love to hear it. But when our economies in in ruin because the majority of cash is being hoarded by a few, then yes I support taking a large portion of it from them for the good of the many.

I seriously doubt currency being hoarded by a few has little effect on the economy, it is certainly not in ruin because of that.

What we have is market manipulation going on. DeBeers and what that have done with the diamond trade is a great example and there are many more.

This huge tax that is supposed to help the little guy, will actually prevent the little guy from ever growing big.

a reply to: jrod

The United States' nominal GDP was estimated to be $16.8 trillion as of 2013.


Bailed-out Banks Facilitate $21 Trillion Offshore Cash Hoard

Global Super Rich Now Hoard $31 Trillion in Tax Havens: Report

Analysis: Bailed-out banks facilitate $21tn offshore cash


Any questions?

a reply to: AlaskanDad

Cash is worthless.

Real wealth is in assets.

a reply to: jrod

Cash is worthless.

Real wealth is in assets.

Quite.
And....how?, exactly?...again? are people who live paycheck to paycheck supposed to EVER have 'assets'?

Answer: They won't. Because "assets" rule the entire country. And 'cash' is all they (the working folks) have. For what it's worth - which is nothing.

What do you not get about that??

Why would you not want people to be able to accumulate 'assets'?

originally posted by: justwokeup
The only person entitled to the wealth is the man or woman who earned it. You are welcome to it while you are alive and I wish you well.

Or whoever I choose to give it to and that decision is not yours, the government's our anyone else's to make.

a reply to: jrod

Sorry but I don't see the point to your post, could you take a little time to clarify how it fits into the discussion?

Thank you!

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originally posted by: AlaskanDad
I mean drug dealers work hard manufacturing illegal drugs, no one feels wrong taking their drugs or their money as it is harmful to the few that use their drugs, right?

Well first you need to prove they got their money from ill gotten gains, then we have a case, but to assume and then take is not the way.

a reply to: Xtrozero

You missed my point drug dealers cause harm to a part of the population and we take their money,

the rich hoarders are causing harm to a portion of the population, so why not take part of their money?

This was posted in response to your asking if I thought taking (stealing your words) money from the rich for taxes was ok by me.

a reply to: grandmakdw

I think people over 2 million a year should pay 99% income tax. If they can't keep any of it maybe they'll pay their employees better. Capital gains taxes on higher incomes should pay the same rate.

a reply to: AlaskanDad

They should set a deadline and if the money isn't brought by the deadline they will have to pay double taxes.

originally posted by: AlaskanDad
a reply to: Xtrozero

You missed my point drug dealers cause harm to a part of the population and we take their money,

the rich hoarders are causing harm to a portion of the population, so why not take part of their money?

This was posted in response to your asking if I thought taking (stealing your words) money from the rich for taxes was ok by me.

Isn't the federal government the biggest rich hoarder of all?

After all a large portion of our tax money goes to line the pockets of contributors to their campaigns, friends and family.

Look at any investigation done on where federal dollars go in the past 20 years+ and that is what they all found, that is where our stimulus money went.

People who think "the rich" are the problem are overlooking
the elite political overclass
who use our tax dollars to live outlandish lifestyles with tax dollars
and funnel "contracts" and high paying do nothing jobs to friends, family and relatives of contributors.

"The rich" are not the problem, it is our sociopathic and greedy federally elected officials who are the real problem.

Arguing about the Walton family is hilarious in this context, they are nothing compared to our Senators, Congressmen, President etc in the economic damage done by their greedy feeding at the public trough - your money, my money for their own selfish lifestyles. That's who people should be mad at.

a reply to: grandmakdw

How can you have out of control goverment spending ie a 74 trillion dollar deficit and be called a hoarder; it's to bad the monies went to a trickle down economy that failed to trickle.

Progressive idea 80% tax - income over $500K doesn't go far enough to fix income inequality

As the tittle says it does not go far enough,

Progressive idea 80% tax - income over $500K doesn't go far enough to fix income inequality,

it does not address the changes that would be needed to clean up congress, does it?

a reply to: AlaskanDad

I was being sarcastic in the title and in the OP

How can the elite political overclass be called hoarders. Because they do not spend my money, you money wisely, they use it to funnel $ to contributors in hopes of getting more money, they funnel it to friends and relatives. They are hoarding our tax dollars to give to their friends, not to help the people. More taxes just gives them more money to spend on themselves and their contributors, friends and relatives. They have no intention of really helping the poor, that is a ruse to get more lavish trips for themselves and their families called junkets or diplomacy, to get more servants called secretaries undersecretaries etc, to pay for outrageously expensive meals known as state dinners or diplomacy etc.

Name one time in recent history (past 15 years) when giving the government extra money to help the economy, to help the poor, etc. really went to what it was supposed to go to. Bet you can't name even one. The infrastructure is still a disaster, but I have actually seen an overpass to nowhere where some contractor lined his pockets, thanks to his elected federal official. You are saying you trust the elite political overclass to really do something in "the people's" interest? Look how badly health care got screwed up. All investigations on all the stimulus money show nearly none went to what the elite political overlords told us they were going to use it for, instead most lined pockets of cronies, contributors, friends and families, .... that's worse than hoarding, that's stealing from the poor, stealing from the downtrodden, and fraud by saying they were taking money from you and from me to do some public works when they had no intention of doing any such thing.

a reply to: grandmakdw


Behind every great fortune there is a crime.

Honore de Balzac French realist novelist (1799 - 1850)

And it is a gret crime the waste and mismanagement and plain corruption of our government, but the status quo has created many a great fortune.

originally posted by: AlaskanDad
a reply to: grandmakdw


Behind every great fortune there is a crime.

Honore de Balzac French realist novelist (1799 - 1850)

And it is a gret crime the waste and mismanagement and plain corruption of our government, but the status quo has created many a great fortune.

So why not clean up the criminals first? The elite political overlords who have stolen so much money from "the people"

Shouldn't we clean up the disaster area before we try to rebuild? Trying to rebuild over the trash will only end up with a new society that is stuck inside the garbage of the old.

a reply to: grandmakdw

imho; it's a really paradox, where you need one, to have the other and there for it can never take place.

I often say, a pirate for president, while it is a jest it's a hint at our need for proportional representation, amongst the many other changes that it would take to fix the corporate / political problems we are facing.

But it was fun pointing out; the greed and hoarding of the rich is harming our society.

a reply to: BuzzyWigs

From The Daily Caller:
“The current welfare system provides such a high level of benefits that it acts as a disincentive for work,” reads the study. “Welfare currently pays more than a minimum-wage job in 35 states, even after accounting for the Earned Income Tax Credit, and in 13 states it pays more than $15 per hour.”

Walmart Employee Subsidizes:
When is someone going to smarten up I am paying for it either way! She gets a raise it's goes to the cost of the product, the government uses tax money I pay, the government just doesn't get as huge a cut. What do you think happens to the cost to the poor when McDonalds raises prices to pay for her pay increase? Your happy meal isn't so happy anymore.

Got up and then left... Then What?:
Yeah its called unions, knock yourself out. IT's your right, Just like finding another job, moving to another city/state.
Changing industries.

College education:
Why should I have to pay for your mistakes? Life isn't fair it never has been. Good god since when do we live in a society where there is always a parachute. You took the chance on school, it was your risk, not mine.

This site is full of left wing people that think they can conduct their life anyway they want without consequence. Take from everyone, just take. Then blame the people you take from when they don't want to give up the money they earned through hard work.

You obviously have no idea what HR is about if you think it is for the benefit of CEO's and investors.

There are over 47 million people receiving food stamps, is that because the 1 percenters aren't paying their fair share?
Is that because the CEO's don't pay enough? Do the math use what you learned in college our government has overspent by roughly 25% of the worlds GDP. Where is there any room for movement left to do anything productive in society creating jobs. In the beginning the POTUS used 800 billion and got zippo. You could have given every citizen about $2500.00 where is the complaining? The only thing that turned out to be shovel ready was the promises.

a reply to: grandmakdw

This is true. None of our money going to the government helps the people but only their cronies. Likewise a lot of private profits go to the government as well via lobbying.
It is said that companies dont pay taxes, the people do.
It can also be said that companies dont pay for lobbyists, the consumer does.

a reply to: MarlinGrace

You obviously have no idea what HR is about if you think it is for the benefit of CEO's and investors.

LOL!!

Really?
The Terrible Fear of Paying the Poor Too Much

They’re passing legislation forbidding towns and counties from raising the minimum wage in their jurisdictions. Republicans insist: no pay bump for those raking in $15,080 a year! On the other side, however, there’s no amount of pay, perks, private jets, premium health plans and golden parachutes that Republican politicians believe could possibly be too much for a CEO.

That Oracle CEO Larry Ellison took home $78,440,657 last year is completely reasonable in the minds of Republicans. That it would take a minimum wage earner 5,201 years to earn what Larry took out of his company for one 365-day period is, according to Republican-think, a morally correct calculation.

That is why Republicans are working so hard to prevent Walmart and McDonald’s workers from earning more money while, at the same time, doing nothing but congratulating Time Warner Cable CEO Rob Marcus for grabbing $79.9 million for six weeks of work.

Republicans don’t believe in paying a living wage to workers they disrespect, like the home health aides providing loving 24-hour care to the frail grandmas of GOP politicians across this country, like the housekeepers who clean GOP presidential hopefuls’ hotel rooms as they campaign across the nation, like the McDonald’s workers denied paid sick days who make extraordinary efforts not to cough on the fries that super-sized Republicans stuff in their faces.

Republicans do believe, though, that the $31 million CVS hands CEO Larry J. Merlo has no effect on the pharmacy’s prices, that the $26 million Ralph Lauren hands its namesake CEO has no effect on the heart-stopping prices he charges for his foreign sweatshop-sewn clothes, and that the $31 million Estee Lauder grants CEO Fabrizio Freda has no effect on the eye-popping prices Lauder charges for its powder and perfume.

The GOP believes CEOs deserve to pocket in one year what it would take the average worker 331 years of labor to earn – a ratio calculated by the AFL-CIO Executive Paywatch team this year. CEOs are just so important, so special, so irreplaceable, according to the GOP.

They’re so much better than the heart surgeon who spends all day every day meticulously saving people’s lives. They’re 331 times as important as the firemen who rush into a burning home to save a woman’s life. They’re 331 time more valuable than the policemen and paramedics who ran toward the sound of an explosion a year ago in Boston to rescue bomb victims. To Republicans, those CEOs are 331 times more precious than the teacher who nurtures the shy child, encourages the faltering student or refuses to abandon the recalcitrant pupil.

What a load of hot air - your post.
I used to work with HR - very closely. You don't have any idea how deep into the 'rabbit hole' I've gone, or what I found out.
LOL!!

a reply to: andr3w68

Here's where your argument completely fails. I built a business from scratch. I didn't have any money or connections to capital, so after careful thought I put the financial future of my 2 kids and wife at risk and maxed out 5 credit cards to the tune of $150,000. Then 2008 crisis hit and all the credit cards pull out some language that allowed them to increase the annual rate to 20+% from the 4% I was paying. I didn't pay myself a salary for 3 years, I didn't save or invest in our retirement...there were times where we were brought to our needs by the magnitude of having so much debt over our heads. I would never do it again....however I worked hard through it all and thanks to an understanding wife today the business is successful and I make over $500K a year. I stress that word, "today", because every day I have to be thinking about how to reinvent the company to make sure that next year I can make even more.

It's not greed, it's called "you have to speculate to accumulate".... in your system, no one will take risks like that to make $500K a year, even a million a year. With kids, college funds, $2000 a month in health insurance (no obamacare for us), life insurance, financial advisers, umbrella insurance, adequately funded retirements, working cars, a nice house and the freedom to not count every penny that goes out the door....$500K is not rich. Hell we live in a rural area of north carolina, at $500K we couldn't afford to live in high tax states like New York and CA. Kids go to public schools, etc.

I'm must saying, some people might make millions, but for most of them, at some point, they placed it all on the line and millions of jobs are created as a result. I've only got 6 employees, but that's 6 more than would have been created without me (or the grace of God).

It's easy to chastise the top 1% until you've actually lived through what it takes to get there, and how difficult it is to stay there once you get there.

Additionally, most people I know who are in a similar income bracket also spend copious amounts of time giving back to the local community, both time and money. For many being an entrepreneur is not satisfying unless the fruits of your labor can also help make the community around you a better place to live.

It's the government and the politicians that are robbing our society and our kids...not those who actually provide the capital and brains to create the jobs.