What are the pros of a flat tax over a proggessive tax?

I see. So "rich" is defined by what "honest people mean when they say someone is rich". Very rigorous criteria you have there.

 

When the majority of our federal tax revenue is paid by the top five percent of income earners, that means the "rich" are paying the "majority" of those taxes.

 

Nonsense. Those programs have provided trillions in welfare to those groups.

Why would we disagree when I did not address either of those points to you?

 

Which it isn't, so stop lying. Income tax doesn't even account for half of all federal tax revenue, so stop lying. "Rich" is not defined by income, so stop lying. You just lie and lie and lie, so stop lying.

No, it doesn't. Rich is not defined by income, income tax is not the majority of federal taxes, and 5% is far too many people to be considered "the rich."

Just how many lies are you trying to pack into a single sentence, anyway?

 

And their landlords have taken it all, which is why those groups are still poor, while their landlords are astronomically rich.

And BTW, the money given to the poor over the previous 50 years was less than the amount given to the rich in just one year of bailouts.

 

That is exactly correct.

 

If that were true, you would have a point.

 

The majority of our Federal revenues are accrued from income taxes:



The vast majority of those revenues come from the top ten percent of income earners, 70.5% as of 2009.

Half of payroll taxes are financed by employers, and virtually all of the corporate income taxes are paid for by the "rich" or the "wealthy". That's about 70% of total federal revenues coming from the "rich".

Mindlessly and petulantly accusing me of lying when I am clearly relying on objective facts and data is the height of ignorance on your part.

It is partly defined by income. You would have to be neurotic to suggest otherwise.

Self-serving nonsense.

I haven't lied once.

 

More bull(*)(*)(*)(*) from you. Trillions go DIRECTLY to the welfare of our populace every year, whether it's food stamps or healthcare, we are shelling out trillions to maintain a massive welfare state. No amount of convoluted sophistry on your part will change that immutable fact.

I don't support the bailouts, so you can just **** about that.

 

Actually, it's juvenile nonsense from a petulant whiner who routinely and maliciously accuses his opponents of lying simply because they do not accept his self-serving and arbitrary definitions of "rich". The fact is, we do not define terms on the basis of what YOU THINK "honest people mean when they say someone is rich". That is just nebulous, self-serving tripe. Try again.

 

It is true and I have demonstrated it using the data. Half of payroll taxes are paid for by employers and 70.5% of income taxes are paid for by the top 10% of income earners.

 

All you did was post a pie chart that shows where revenues come from. Proves nothing.

Individuals don't pay the business half of employee FICA. Businesses do.

 

In 2007, 39.6% of all federal taxes were attributed to the richest 5%. And that includes apportioning the vast buk of corporate taxes, which rich individuals don't pay. Take out corporate tax they don't pay and that number falls even further.

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/43373-Supplemental_Tables_Final.xls

That a far cry from more than half.

 

It proves that the majority of federal tax revenues come from income taxes.

A "business" is just a group of individuals. Half of payroll taxes are paid for by employers, like I said.

 

In that same year, the bottom 60% of income earners paid a total of 15.3% of federal taxes.

According to your own data, the one percent accounted for 47.1% of all corporate income tax liabilities in 2009. I guess when you don't have an argument, you just make stuff up and hope no one notices.

Nonsense.

Your own data proves that the richest in our country pay the vast majority of taxes.

 

Corporate taxes are levied on corporate profits, not individuals. The income taxes paid by individuals account for about 42% of all tax revenues. Just a little more than SS taxes.

A business is not an individual and doesn't pay the individual income tax. And individuals do not pay the business 1/2 of employee's SS taxes.

 

Doesn't matter. Corporate INCOME TAXES are TAXES ON INCOME.

Yup, and 9% comes from corporate income taxes.

I never said a business was an individual. I said a business is just a group of individuals, so no matter how you look at it, some individual or set of individuals is paying payroll taxes that could otherwise go to their business.

 

That is the amount that is apportioned to them, not necessarily the amount they actual pay. Again, it includes an apportionment of corporate taxes (mostly to the richest) which individuals do not pay.

See above. Of course, the 1% do not actually pay that tax, corporations do. The CBO apportions corporate taxes based on capital and labor income:

Corporate income taxes are allocated to households according to their share of capital and labor income. Federal excise taxes are allocated to households according to their consumption of the taxed good or service.

So while this methodology allocates over 50% of corporate taxes to the richest 1% (which is really amazing, when you think about it) they actually do not pay this tax.

See above.

As they should. They take the majority of income and control the vast majority of wealth.

 

Sure it does. You were citing stats based on the individual income taxes. I know it is easy to be confused, but the corporate tax is tax based on profit and has all kids of different rules and tax levels, compared to the individual income tax, which is a tax based on income to the individual.

But despite the fact that your little chart has the word "income" in both, they are complete different things.

Let me know if you still don't get it and I'll try to find a basic primer for you.

Varies based on corporate profits, but that sounds about right.

A business pays the employer portion of the employee tax. Individuals do not pay it in their individual taxes.

When you are citing data based on individual income taxes, you cannot then fairly add in the corporate taxes to prove that individual income taxes are more than 50% of all revenues.

 

But not the income of human persons, which is what your statistics were based on.

Which is indisputably false. A business is a non-human, abstract entity that engages in economic activity for profit.

Some individual or set of individuals ultimately pays all taxes. So what?

 

No lies: You have done the work for me and established that everything that you have written is utter nonsense.

So sad. You have read “millions of words” of economic theory and understand absolutely nothing. What a waste of time reading all of those words

I have no idea what you are advocating or arguing. The only thing that I can extrapolate from your ramblings is that you hold irrational negative emotions towards folk that you deem to be “rich.”

I am not lying about anything: You merely are not able to comprehend anything (as usual). I already established that property taxes already exist, and a Fair Tax has nothing to do with the eradication of property taxes.

WOW! Where have you been? This whole discussion has been about equality in taxation. I have been arguing for over a week that the progressive income tax is the epitome of inequality, and it would be wise to replace it with a Fair Tax, which IS an equitable tax. You CLEARLY need to take a course on reading comprehension.

Then via a progressive income tax you also essentially tax consumption, since you directly tax peoples’ production, thereby limiting their power to consume (via confiscation of their income). At least through a Fair Tax we are allowing people to keep their hard-earned money, thereby increasing their ability/power to consume.

 

LOL! Most of these “rich” people that you irrationally hate so much work harder than you could possibly imagine.

Calling everything that doesn’t agree with your warped ideology a “lie” seems to be your only comeback. It’s quite childish, and it is very clear that you have no argument.

For the millionth time. “Rich” people do not do this under the current progressive tax system, and they cannot do this under a Fair Tax system. To purpose what you are proposing is ludicrous, and a clear sign of desperation.

You are merely rehashing nonsense that I have already disproven. It is a obvious fact that the vast majority of “rich” gain their wealth through hard work and sacrifice, and not via “land titles, IP monopolies, banks' debt money issuance, etc."

Only in your mind.

No. You continue to purposely redefine what a Fair Tax is and continue to state lie after lie. You must be dreaming if you think that you are telling the truth.

So because ONE man (in the early 1900s) felt that he was being used, the true purpose of the ENTIRE military, which (since the early 1900s) has numbered in the TENS OF MILLIONS, is therefore negated?! That’s some twisted logic there.

You need to take your own advice.

How is that not relevant? The POTUS influences money policy and taxation. Hence, his definition of “rich” matters A LOT more than yours, since you have no such influence over taxation policies.

Nope. I have already established the undeniable fact that the armed services protect our country as a whole, not just “rich” people. It is lunacy to think otherwise.

Poor people can also be owners, and rich people do not necessarily have to be owners. Hence, this is yet another one of your premises that is based on an absurd lie.

If it is so “false and stupid,” then why can’t you formulate a cogent and legitimate argument against it?

LOL! You know nothing but left-wing propaganda that unfairly and unnecessarily demonizes folk that you arbitrarily determine to be “rich.” That isn’t knowledge: It’s garbage.
 

 

Darn right. Government intervention is an impediment on the income of physicians: That’s a well-known fact (and it's pretty obvious). The government makes it illegal to charge patients for certain services (e.g. being called in the middle of the night for a patient emergency cannot be billed for) and it put arbitrary caps on services.

LOL! Bloated incomes?! Parasitic?! You clearly know nothing about the American healthcare system. Outside of the military, you would be hard-pressed to find a more heroic, hard-working profession that is so dedicated towards the benefit of others for an ever-diminishing income.

And it's so obvious that physicians like myself are "parasitic": I have saved the lives of dozens upon dozens of patients this past year and admitted 1,000 patients to our hospital. Yet, my salary is LESS that the salaries of our do-nothing members of the Senate and House of Representatives, and it's less than HALF of that of the POTUS. who doesn't take responsibility for anything. Yeah, it's clearly physicians that are the "parasites" of our society.

The only lies, yet again, are coming from YOU. From the NIH website ( http://www.niaid.nih.gov/researchfunding/qa/Pages/budget.aspx#level : Who sets NIAID's funding level and appropriates our dollars, and how does this work?
Congress appropriates our funds. Before that happens, NIAID prepares a budget justification that goes to NIH, HHS, and OMB. It then becomes part of the Department's budget justification, which is part of the President's budget request to Congress for the next fiscal year.
As NIH is part of the executive branch of the federal government, NIH defends the President's budget before Congress during the appropriations hearings in March or April. Congress then prepares and must pass its own appropriations legislation,

Hence, it is quite clear that the NIH is funded by the federal government.

Either way, the theory involves a land tax, and he talks nothing of a value of a Fair Tax versus a Federal Income Tax. Hence, my point stands that his states are irrelevant to this discussion.

No. You brought up a land tax, when this wasn’t even part of the original discussion. You have YET to discredit the Fair Tax as a legitimate and EQUITABLE method of taxation.

Then you should have never butted into my discussion with Iremon (since the fairness of the Federal Income Tax vs. Fair Tax was the focus of our discussion).

I’m not going to dignify this stupidity with anything, since it would be a pure waste of my time.

According to both Obama and Romney, my wife and I are “rich.” Yet, we (and the vast majority of “rich” people) have ZERO control over the political process. THAT is a fact known to anyone with the capacity of logical thought.

Absolutely nonsense again. They pay nothing for the above “entitlement” programs. It is a “free” service to them supplied for by those of us that pay a net-positive amount into the system.

Your “explanation” was a bunch of garbage. It’s irrational to think that “landowners” benefit more that those who do not own land. Many “rich” people live in apartments. How do you explain that dichotomy? Shouldn’t such a thing be impossible according to the trash that you have been writing?

Wrong as usual. It is a FACT. The Fair Tax benefits all people because it allows them to actually keep their hard earned money, rather than automatically having a significant portion of the paycheck go to the federal government where it will certainly be squandered. It will force the idle, greedy and privileged POOR to think twice before buying luxury items that they really cannot afford.

And please explain to us how in the world “rich” people will benefit, since they STILL will be the ones paying more in taxes via a Fair Tax.

The only garbage is coming from your keyboard. You have failed to explain your points and are merely repeating the same hackneyed talking points.

Oh. So because you anecdotally know some people that you deem to be “rich” and judge them to be “greedy, privileged parasites,” then of course ALL “rich” people are greedy, privileged parasites I’d hate to know your opinion on all Jewish people or all Black people if you met a stereotypically frugal Jew or a stereotypically criminal Black person.

 

So toys for your kids, gasoline, an air filter, pet food... those are luxuries? No, of course they aren't but they would all be taxed under the "Fair" tax.

It's fact that the poor spend a greater percentage of their income on consumer goods than the most wealthy and as a result, the Un-Fair tax drastically shifts the tax burden onto the poorest people in society. It's grossly regressive and it's name is a complete and utter farce. Moreover, since all taxes affect behavior and this tax directly impacts consumption, we could anticipate it causing a great deal of harm to everyone... why on Earth would we ever want to create a disincentive to consume? We wouldn't... that'd be dumb.

As for doctors, they greatly benefit from the barriers to entry created by government. Whether the AMA is useful or necessary is another conversation, but the fact they collect rents from this gating is a statement of objective fact.

 

Since you bolded this, I assume it is very important to your beliefs about the "Fair"tax.

I don't believe your understanding of how the "Fair"tax works is accurate. Please link to the source that shows the Fair tax is only levied on luxury items.

Sounds like another mislead person by the type of deceipt we've seen from the "Fair"tax folks so frequently.