Occupy Wall Street

[Shiftdnb]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPw-3e_pzqU[/youtube]

[jsence2]

perfect example of why you have to consider the source of where you're getting your information. All statistics can be skewed one way or another. Here is a link that shows you, year by year, bracket by bracket, the breakdown of marginal tax rates--each year has a seperate list for regular AND for adjustment for inflation (the key reason why you can't compare money from the 1950s to now):

http://www.taxfoundation.org/files/fed_ ... 110909.pdf

Key example, without inflation adjustment, the tax rate for 100K+ in 1945 is 90%, but when adjusted for inflation, its 37%. Major major difference.

[Shiftdnb]

Even more confusing cause what you just sent backs up what I'm saying. I took as an example, 1954, so I found it on that sheet you gave me.

[jsence2]

Even more confusing cause what you just sent backs up what I'm saying. I took as an example, 1954, so I found it on that sheet you gave me.

Did you look at BOTH breakdowns? here is 1952 for a married household:

1952 Nominal: 90% if you made over 100K INCOME

1952 Inflation adjusted w 26.5 CPI: 48% if you made over 100K INCOME

Difference when adjusted: 42%

When you see a year on there, Shift, and it says "nominal" at the top, scroll down another page to see the "inflation adjusted".

[Shiftdnb]

Okay, I get what you're saying now. Okay now lets take that 350,000 for the top 1% of today like you said and they're still taxed 69%. Right now we are fighting going from 36% to 39%

[jsence2]

Okay, I get what you're saying now. Okay now lets take that 350,000 for the top 1% of today like you said and they're still taxed 69%. Right now we are fighting going from 36% to 39%

But that's the thing, 350K then wasn't the top 1%. Again, you can't compare the same eras. How many people do you think brought in 350,000 INCOME per year in 1952???? I'd venture to say less than 100 people total!

[DRiccio21]

why are you getting mad when we call you a socialist?

your ideals are socialist... it is what it is... we all want our country to be better, but your thoughts of how to do it are ass backwards.
i also think we should be easy about saying 'jealous'... having money doesn't mean shit. but i would say you are very misinformed about a bunch of topics. to say that we should just let top talent leave is certainly one of them.

[jsence2]

Here are the numbers according to the 1952 US Census Bureau, located at http://www2.census.gov/prod2/popscan/p60-015.pdf:

Median income for a family: $3,890
Percentage of families over $25,000: 0.4%
Percentage of familiest between $15,000 and 24,999: 0.7%

So your "top 1%" was making over $15,000....less than half of that 1% was taxed over $25,000 income--which was a 24.6% taxable bracket in 1952, when adjusted for inflation.

So now your argument is totally shot, the top 1% is being taxed HIGHER NOW than they were then.

Man, this is kinda fun for me....it's like being back in college again, pouring through historical government microfiche and collections.

[Shiftdnb]

Here are the numbers according to the 1952 US Census Bureau, located at http://www2.census.gov/prod2/popscan/p60-015.pdf:

Median income for a family: $3,890
Percentage of families over $25,000: 0.4%
Percentage of familiest between $15,000 and 24,999: 0.7%

So your "top 1%" was making over $15,000....less than half of that 1% was taxed over $25,000 income--which was a 24.6% taxable bracket in 1952, when adjusted for inflation.

So now your argument is totally shot, the top 1% is being taxed HIGHER NOW than they were then.

Man, this is kinda fun for me....it's like being back in college again, pouring through historical government microfiche and collections.

I call bullshit on these numbers. Sorry but from what I'm reading either you've discovered something no one has ever discovered before or you're just spinning numbers.

[jsence2]

Here are the numbers according to the 1952 US Census Bureau, located at http://www2.census.gov/prod2/popscan/p60-015.pdf:

Median income for a family: $3,890
Percentage of families over $25,000: 0.4%
Percentage of familiest between $15,000 and 24,999: 0.7%

So your "top 1%" was making over $15,000....less than half of that 1% was taxed over $25,000 income--which was a 24.6% taxable bracket in 1952, when adjusted for inflation.

So now your argument is totally shot, the top 1% is being taxed HIGHER NOW than they were then.

Man, this is kinda fun for me....it's like being back in college again, pouring through historical government microfiche and collections.

I call bullshit on these numbers. Sorry but from what I'm reading either you've discovered something no one has ever discovered before or you're just spinning numbers.

....or maybe I don't have an agenda so I'm not trying to throw base numbers out there. How can you call bullshit when I CITED the numbers for you?!?!?! I gave you a government document to back them up, what better source do you want?

You can't just call bullshit because you don't like the numbers. I was a history major in college, I don't just throw random crap out there without backing it up. I gave you documentation from legit sources, what more do you want?

[Shiftdnb]

Sorry I just call bullshit cause the one thing glaring at me in the face is the fact they go all the way up to $200,000 in 1952. If the top 1% earners were only making $15,000, why the hell are they going to have a bracket all the way up to $200,000?

My rebuttal on your numbers as they are, is you don't make note of the fact the top 1% were only making 3 times the median family income according to your estimates. Today, the average median family income is 52,000, if the 1% today are making 350,000 like you claim, that is now 6 to 7 times higher than the average median income of a family. Not to mention the cost of living adjustment was 43.7 in 1952 and it's now 320.2. You can spit your numbers and claim they're actually getting taxed higher today compared to then, but you have to look at the whole picture.

[DRiccio21]

if the 1% today are making 350,000 like you claim

are you still calling us liars?

i mean shit, we've posted like 5 articles that cite this.

'like YOU claim'

[Shiftdnb]

if the 1% today are making 350,000 like you claim

are you still calling us liars?

i mean shit, we've posted like 5 articles that cite this.

'like YOU claim'

You're trying to tell me the top 1% is the people that total incomes are 350,000 a year, but meanwhile I see things like the article below and know that athletes themselves get millions of dollars a year. The numbers just don't add up to me.

http://money.cnn.com/2011/08/15/news/ec ... htm?iid=EL


As far as you calling me a socialist, I had to sleep on it last night and figure out why it was bothering me so much. I don't like you calling me a socialist just because I want to raise taxes on the rich. You pigeon hole me like if I were just to call you greedy and heartless, because of the very bottom of what you support there is greed and the humanity is taken right out of it. Have I once specifically called you greedy or heartless? It's almost like telling a Marine he's in the Navy, he might have a link to the Navy but he's a fucking Marine.

[jsence2]

if the 1% today are making 350,000 like you claim

are you still calling us liars?

i mean shit, we've posted like 5 articles that cite this.

'like YOU claim'

You're trying to tell me the top 1% is the people that total incomes are 350,000 a year, but meanwhile I see things like the article below and know that athletes themselves get millions of dollars a year. The numbers just don't add up to me.

http://money.cnn.com/2011/08/15/news/ec ... htm?iid=EL


As far as you calling me a socialist, I had to sleep on it last night and figure out why it was bothering me so much. I don't like you calling me a socialist just because I want to raise taxes on the rich. You pigeon hole me like if I were just to call you greedy and heartless, because of the very bottom of what you support there is greed and the humanity is taken right out of it. Have I once specifically called you greedy or heartless? It's almost like telling a Marine he's in the Navy, he might have a link to the Navy but he's a fucking Marine.

There's the difference, Shift--you're relying on a biased article (CNN, really? Why not just post something from Daily Kos) instead of looking up the numbers yourself. I sent you the numbers; I showed you unbiased sources (historical government documents are about as unbiased as you can get), and yet you STILL claim we're wrong. Posting an article that backs up your claim is NOT proving anything, we can all do that. Find us some hard, concrete facts and then we'll reconsider your stance. When I go and post indisputable facts and you claim "bullshit", well....what more do you want?

[Shiftdnb]

if the 1% today are making 350,000 like you claim

are you still calling us liars?

i mean shit, we've posted like 5 articles that cite this.

'like YOU claim'

You're trying to tell me the top 1% is the people that total incomes are 350,000 a year, but meanwhile I see things like the article below and know that athletes themselves get millions of dollars a year. The numbers just don't add up to me.

http://money.cnn.com/2011/08/15/news/ec ... htm?iid=EL


As far as you calling me a socialist, I had to sleep on it last night and figure out why it was bothering me so much. I don't like you calling me a socialist just because I want to raise taxes on the rich. You pigeon hole me like if I were just to call you greedy and heartless, because of the very bottom of what you support there is greed and the humanity is taken right out of it. Have I once specifically called you greedy or heartless? It's almost like telling a Marine he's in the Navy, he might have a link to the Navy but he's a fucking Marine.

There's the difference, Shift--you're relying on a biased article (CNN, really? Why not just post something from Daily Kos) instead of looking up the numbers yourself. I sent you the numbers; I showed you unbiased sources (historical government documents are about as unbiased as you can get), and yet you STILL claim we're wrong. Posting an article that backs up your claim is NOT proving anything, we can all do that. Find us some hard, concrete facts and then we'll reconsider your stance. When I go and post indisputable facts and you claim "bullshit", well....what more do you want?

Who the fuck am I a god damn graduate student, I can't sit there and decipher a census report from 1952, while all you did was provide numbers that made no sense to me. Of course I'm going to use a report that's already written, I already said I wasn't the best to be giving you detailed information. As far as what you produced, I still don't think your numbers are correct and if they are they're skewed to what you want to portray. Only thing is I can't sit there and dig deep enough to show what I'm trying to convey and call you on your bullshit. Makes no sense to me they would have several brackets higher than your supposed 15,000 was the 1%.

I should have just went with a BEEFY type approach and leave well enough alone.

[Crowes]

if the 1% today are making 350,000 like you claim

are you still calling us liars?

i mean shit, we've posted like 5 articles that cite this.

'like YOU claim'

You're trying to tell me the top 1% is the people that total incomes are 350,000 a year, but meanwhile I see things like the article below and know that athletes themselves get millions of dollars a year. The numbers just don't add up to me.

http://money.cnn.com/2011/08/15/news/ec ... htm?iid=EL


As far as you calling me a socialist, I had to sleep on it last night and figure out why it was bothering me so much. I don't like you calling me a socialist just because I want to raise taxes on the rich. You pigeon hole me like if I were just to call you greedy and heartless, because of the very bottom of what you support there is greed and the humanity is taken right out of it. Have I once specifically called you greedy or heartless? It's almost like telling a Marine he's in the Navy, he might have a link to the Navy but he's a fucking Marine.

In your article it says that people making over a million dollars a year represent just 0.2% of tax returns ... Why is it so wrong that 350,000 would be 1%?

[jsence2]

As far as what you produced, I still don't think your numbers are correct and if they are they're skewed to what you want to portray. Only thing is I can't sit there and dig deep enough to show what I'm trying to convey and call you on your bullshit. Makes no sense to me they would have several brackets higher than your supposed 15,000 was the 1%.

I should have just went with a BEEFY type approach and leave well enough alone.

Wait wait wait, so let me get this straight.....because it makes no sense to you or because you don't think they're correct, you tell me I'm wrong???

I gave you the sources; and the census numbers are laid out in a table, it's not hard to read.

But yeah, with what you just said....I'll let Dr Cox play me out of this discussion.

[DRiccio21]

shift, the top 1% of american's makes 350k per year. its a fact... i don't know what else to tell you. the data comes directly from the IRS.

i keep calling you a socialist because your ideals are socialistic, again i'm not intended to degrate you or make you feel bad or less american... you want socialism based on what you're telling everyone and the stuff you say. i giggle when you say things like 'we need to take care of the less fortunate' because by saying that you are pretty much saying that wealthy people don't care about less fortunate people and people who make less money are morally better people... thats ignorant, factually incorrect, and just naive.

i am calling you out on the stuff you're saying because when i counter with facts or with examples, you just change the subject or claim ignorance. and without a basic knowledge of tax code (which you have claimed you don't really get), and i'm talking tax 101 type stuff, how can you just sit there and keep saying 'TAX RICH PEOPLE!!'. you aren't even sure what you want taxed. you are saying you want wealth taxed now? you do realize that accumulated wealth comes from TAXED money already. income is 350k for the top 1% and as brwnbear pointed out numerous times, those people pay far more than anyone else.

so you either want to just raise taxes on people cause they are successful or you want to double tax people cause they have more than you... those are socialist ideals. again, i mean no harm, just calling a spade a spade.

and you continue to miss the point that since we live in a globalized world now, much more so than in any other comparable era... by not being competitive or on top of business friendly regulations, we'll lose more successful people and businesses to countries that are willing to give them better opportunities. so even if we did what you wanted and it made sense (which it doesnt) we're going to lose the poeple/new businesses we need to get back on top.

[GeorgesGoons]

I put to motion that Dave pays all of our taxes for the year. You won't have to pay anything for me Dave as I usually get a nice chunk back at the end of the year and I'll even get a bigger chunk this year since I have 7 months of non-taxable income.

[nick]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/ ... story.html

A quarter of millionaires in the United States pay a smaller share of their income in federal taxes than many middle-class families, according to a new congressional analysis that offers fresh support for President Obama’s push to raise taxes on the nation’s wealthiest households.

The report, by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, found that when all federal taxes are taken into account — including those on wages, investment income and corporate profits — some households earning more than $1 million a year paid as little as 24 percent of their income to the Internal Revenue Service in 2006.

That’s substantially less than the share paid by many families making less than $100,000 a year that faced a top effective tax rate exceeding 26.5 percent, the report said.

All told, 94,500 millionaires paid a smaller share of their income in taxes than 10 million households with moderate incomes, the report found.

“Most Americans think millionaires ought to be paying a higher rate than middle-class taxpayers, not a lower one,” said Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), who has long urged policymakers to raise taxes on the wealthiest households. “This report increases the momentum for our proposal to ensure millionaires pay their fair share.”

The report offers the first government analysis of federal tax data since billionaire investor Warren Buffett, a former Washington Post Co. board member, complained that he pays a lower tax rate than the 20 employees in his office, who earn much less than he does. After Buffett wrote an op-ed in the New York Times, Obama argued that policymakers should overhaul the tax code to ensure that millionaires pay at least as large a share of their income in taxes as middle-class families do, a principle the president dubbed “the Buffett Rule.”

Late Tuesday, Senate Republicans rejected a variation on the Buffett Rule — a 5.6 percent surtax on income over $1 million — to cover the cost of Obama’s $447 billion jobs package.

Critics initially blasted the Buffett Rule, arguing that the average millionaire already pays a significantly higher effective tax rate than middle-class families do. The CRS report, by Thomas L. Hungerford, a specialist in public finance, found that to be true: Millionaires, on average, paid about 30 percent of their income in federal taxes, while households earning less than $100,000 paid closer to 19 percent.

But the averages hide wide variations within income categories, Hungerford wrote, with millionaires paying anywhere from 24 percent to more than 35 percent of their income in federal taxes. The lower tax bills are primarily the result of low tax rates on investment income, such as capital gains and dividends.

Although ordinary earnings are subject to payroll taxes as well as income tax rates as high as 35 percent, investment income — which constitutes the bulk of earnings for many very wealthy households — is taxed at no more than 15 percent.

“The current U.S. tax system violates the Buffett rule in that a large proportion of millionaires pay a smaller percentage of their income in taxes than [do] a significant proportion of moderate-income taxpayers,” Hungerford wrote, although “not to the extent alluded to by Mr. Buffett.”

Congressional Republicans have attacked the Buffett Rule, as well as the idea for a surtax on millionaires, as “class warfare.” They argue that raising taxes on millionaires would penalize many small businesses, the primary engine of U.S. job growth. They also oppose raising taxes on investment income, arguing that doing so would discourage savings and risk-taking.

The CRS report offers a withering rebuttal to both claims. Just 1 percent of tax returns with business income have adjusted gross income of more than $1 million a year, the report says, and those businesses are some of the least likely to create jobs.

“Many observers claim that small businesses are the primary creators of jobs,” Hungerford wrote, but “most of the research cited by these observers is from the 1980s. More recent research suggests that small businesses contribute only slightly more jobs than larger business.”

The main difference “appears to be due to hiring by new startup firms,” which “generally do not generate much business income in their first years in operation.” Consequently, higher taxes on millionaires are unlikely to affect them, the report says.

As to savings, the report argues that private savings rates have fallen over the past 30 years even as the capital gains tax rate dropped from 28 percent in 1987 to 15 percent today, suggesting that “changing capital gains tax rates have had little effect on private saving.”