I feel left out

For First Time It Takes A Billion To Make Magazine's List Of The Richest Americans

And I'm not even a millionaire...

This is another case of the rich get richer. Here's one reason from here:

...
In 1960, the tycoons of America paid a marginal tax rate of 90 percent, which came to an effective rate of about 50 percent after all deductions and credits.

...
Now billionaire tycoons pay an effective tax rate of about 15 percent, or none at all if their accountants and tax attorneys are clever enough.
...

No, that's not the reason you're not even a millionaire. It's because you don't make enough money.......or your spouse has a credit card. :lol:

Now billionaire tycoons pay an effective tax rate of about 15 percent, or none at all if their accountants and tax attorneys are clever enough.

And, of course, they'll still draw their social security checks when they hit 65.

The obvious solution is get a better accountant.

The less obvious is to find ways to be content with what you have, rather than wallow in the envy at what others seem to have.

You can also seek opportunities to improve.

Are you saying you don't pay taxes wolf?

I probably end up overpaying my taxes. I do not have an accountant. In fact, this year was the first that I had tax preparation software. It did not find any interesting or hidden deductions for me.

But I still got a refund. I know it's my money, and I paid the government for the privilege of letting them use it for 12 months and all, but there is just something special about getting that rainbow-colored check in the mail, even if I do miss the punch-card holes that used to be in it.

marichiko wrote:

And, of course, they'll still draw their social security checks when they hit 65.

But only from salaries. :rolleyes:

wolf wrote:

...
The less obvious is to find ways to be content with what you have, rather than wallow in the envy at what others seem to have.
...

All I want is a big screen TV and a second bathroom (for a family of 5). And this chair (The Jerk).

I'm not wallowing in envy. I just think our country would be better off with a smaller gap between rich and poor.

Spexxvet wrote:

I'm not wallowing in envy. I just think our country would be better off with a smaller gap between rich and poor.

This is a country where our lower class still owns atleast 1 car, cell phone, and color TV on average. Mexico has a huge gap between rich and poor, our gap is tolerable. There will always be a gap between the rich and poor, especially in a capitalist society, thats how the distinction is made.

First, there are plenty of poor people without cars and cell phones. Just look at the buses. And do you really need to specify "color" TV? Your "capitalism yay!" cliche is a couple of decades out of date.

Second, all of that is worthless if you have no health insurance in today's society.

That's where the real distinction between rich and poor is made these days.

Happy Monkey wrote:

First, there are plenty of poor people without cars and cell phones. Just look at the buses. And do you really need to specify "color" TV? Your "capitalism yay!" cliche is a couple of decades out of date.

Second, all of that is worthless if you have no health insurance in today's society.

That's where the real distinction between rich and poor is made these days.

1: I didn't say that all poor ppl have cars. And sometimes ppl choose the bus or train over driving, every member of my family owns a car and we have still ridden the bus rather than drive in Dallas.
2: Yes I do need to specify "color" TV because black and white TVs are less expensive. And that is the term that most surveys use.
3: I wasn't necessarily promoting capitalism (I never said that I approve of our capitalist society)...I actually admire what Karl Marx was trying to do with communism. And wish that it had been successful but our current communist countries and the USSR are examples of how ineffective communism is on a large scale. Not that capitalism is much better but atleast members of a capitalist society have a better chance of changing things. Which we have done throughout our history.
4: I know many people who have/ have had no health insurance, and I would not and they would not consider themselves poor. I have health insurance and I consider myself poor. Even if you don't have health insurance...you can still recieve health care.
5: I am not including the homeless in any of my arguments...they are a different class altogether.
6: Please do not misread my post and then make a poorly developed hostile response to it.

I have no health insurance. Does that mean I'm poor? :eek:

And don't forget, Spexx, that those billionaires use all that extra tax free income to stimulate our economy, which benefits us all. For example, Jose might not have his own pickup and weedeater for his lawn service. LaShawna might not have that Merry Maids position. My own son might not have that pizza delivery opportunity.

Yes, billionaires and their tax free income are the backbone of this country. Don't forget..the Trickle Down theory does *not* refer to urine!

Stormieweather wrote:

I have no health insurance. Does that mean I'm poor? :eek:

Not if you never get sick.

morethanpretty wrote:

1: I didn't say that all poor ppl have cars. And sometimes ppl choose the bus or train over driving, every member of my family owns a car and we have still ridden the bus rather than drive in Dallas.
2: Yes I do need to specify "color" TV because black and white TVs are less expensive. And that is the term that most surveys use.
...
6: Please do not misread my post and then make a poorly developed hostile response to it.

My response was primarily to the old "US poor are living like kings with their cheap consumer goods! Look - [COLOR=red]C[/COLOR][COLOR=green]O[/COLOR][COLOR=blue]L[/COLOR][COLOR=darkorange]O[/COLOR][COLOR=purple]R[/COLOR] TVs!" cliche that is so often used to dismiss class issues.

She didn't say they're living like kings, only that they lead much better lives than the poor in other countries.

Happy Monkey wrote:

My response was primarily to the old "US poor are living like kings with their cheap consumer goods! Look - [COLOR=red]C[/COLOR][COLOR=green]O[/COLOR][COLOR=blue]L[/COLOR][COLOR=darkorange]O[/COLOR][COLOR=purple]R[/COLOR] TVs!" cliche that is so often used to dismiss class issues.

morethanpretty wrote:

2: Yes I do need to specify "color" TV because black and white TVs are less expensive. And that is the term that most surveys use.

6: Please do not misread my post and then make a poorly developed hostile response to it.

9th Engineer wrote:

She didn't say they're living like kings, only that they lead much better lives than the poor in other countries.

Thank you 9th.

Trust me, veryveryveryveryVERY few Americans are as poor as most Chinese, or (and ESPECIALLY) North Koreans... not to mention Thais, Indonesians, Vietnamese, Cambodians...

Poor in America is still poor, and not a good thing, but its better than MIDDLE-CLASS lots of places.

And yes, I've SEEN those places.

But what is the purpose of making that comparison? Is being better off than third world countries something worth bragging about? Is something good enough as long as it could be worse?

Happy Monkey wrote:

But what is the purpose of making that comparison? Is being better off than third world countries something worth bragging about? Is something good enough as long as it could be worse?

Eventually things have to be good enough. Don't you think that Bill Gates has enough money, or do you think he needs to try and increase his profits even more? We are not bragging we are comparing. We compare ourselves to others so that we have a idea of how much we know where we place on a world scale. Kinda like when they survey and say that 30% make $(A) a year; 40% make $(B) a year, and 25% make $(D) a year and 5% picked other. It is just a comparison

I'm not making any judgement ON the fact, I'm just backing up that it is true.

Ibram wrote:

Trust me, veryveryveryveryVERY few Americans are as poor as most Chinese, or (and ESPECIALLY) North Koreans... not to mention Thais, Indonesians, Vietnamese, Cambodians...

Poor in America is still poor, and not a good thing, but its better than MIDDLE-CLASS lots of places.

And yes, I've SEEN those places.

I've seen what it is to be poor in Brazil, and its absolutely heartbreaking. I am not very happy about being poor in America, but I live like a queen compared to those folks in Brazil. I don't have a cell phone, but I do have an old color TV that I bought at a pawn shop. My car is a very expensity necessity that drives me crazy, worrying how to maintain it. I live in a small town, 19 miles away from my doctor and the nearest grocery store. There is NO public transportation out here, so without a car, you're dead meat. I manage to scrape together money for my Internet service, though, and I do get medical care and I never go to bed hungry. I'm sure a poor person in Brazil would give their left nut to trade places with me.

The problem in the US is that the gulf between the rich and the poor has been getting wider for quite some now. The lower and middle classes bear the lion's share of the tax burden, while the billionaire skates. Meanwhile funding for stuff like education and public health keeps getting cut, and we spend zillions of dollars on an immoral foreign war.

In the end, comparing the US to some poor third world country is a cop-out. Its like saying, "I may be a thief, but at least I don't kill people." True enough, but its still wrong to steal, and since when did the US need to compare itself to the likes of Cambodia or Brazil?

morethanpretty wrote:

Eventually things have to be good enough.

I hope so. That's the goal, anyway.

Before we get carried away with statements about how the rich are getting away without paying taxes lets look at some numbers

Income Class tax generation

top 25% - 83.9 % of US tax revenue

top 10% - 65.8% of US tax revenue

top 5% - 54.4% of US tax revenue

top 1% - 34.3% of US tax revenue


http://www.nationalreview.com/nrof_bartlett/bartlett200512070900.asp

How does that compare to wealth distribution?

Tax burden shifts to the middle :cool:

From original article:

... But in 1960, it was also the case that over two-thirds of Americans said they trusted government to do the right thing most of the time. ...

These days I trust individuals to do the right thing more than government. I think that The Gates and The Bono should decide rather than The Bushes.

I paid $970,000 in Federal Taxes in 1999, so I appreciated reducing to that level by my own decisions to fund specific schools and charities of my own choice. (note: my tax rate was 50%, being "new money").

My newest stock options in several companies may pay out again. I'd rather decide where my donations go rather than the government decide. What's wrong with that?

Also, the federal government should allow stock dividends to be expensed by the company rather than the idiotic double-taxation of corporate dividends to investors. Current law favors risky growth-first stocks, at what national interest?

xoxoxoBruce wrote:

Tax burden shifts to the middle :cool:

... The CBO study, due to be released today, found that the wealthiest 20 percent, whose incomes averaged $182,700 in 2001, saw their share of federal taxes drop from 64.4 percent of total tax payments in 2001 to 63.5 percent this year. ...

This is seriously unconvincing. I know a lot of people making a lot less than they did in 2001.

I can't believe that 20% of Americans make more than $180K a year. That's just ridiculous.

Rock Steady wrote:

From original article:

... But in 1960, it was also the case that over two-thirds of Americans said they trusted government to do the right thing most of the time. ...

These days I trust individuals to do the right thing more than government. I think that The Gates and The Bono should decide rather than The Bushes.

...
Yeah, but what about the guys from Enron and Worldcom deciding?

Rock Steady wrote:

My newest stock options in several companies may pay out again. I'd rather decide where my donations go rather than the government decide. What's wrong with that?

The problem with that is that we're all likely to help those who are like us. If you donate to the Baptist church, they'll help Baptists. Donate to the Rotary Club, and they give scholarships to kids in their own communities - which means the wealthier communities get bigger/more scholarships. So poor, inner-city folks give what little they can, if anything, and those in their communities, who need the most, get the least.

In regards to the taxation issue. I can't find the resultant tax rate or tax dollars paid by these groups of folks. If your income is, say, $1 million, how much tax do you really pay? What percentage of their income does that represent? How much for the $51K to $75K range? What is their disposable income? I've searched for this info, but I can't seem to find what I'm looking for.

The question remains: Is the US better off with a large gap between rich and poor, or a small gap?

The US is best off when there is mobility: opportunity for the poor to become rich, no matter what the definition of those two things is.

One of the biggest factors creating a rich/poor "gap" is the Social Security system. SS is a regressive system that takes from the poor and gives to the rich.

Rock Steady wrote:

... The CBO study, due to be released today, found that the wealthiest 20 percent, whose incomes averaged $182,700 in 2001, saw their share of federal taxes drop from 64.4 percent of total tax payments in 2001 to 63.5 percent this year. ...

This is seriously unconvincing. I know a lot of people making a lot less than they did in 2001.

I can't believe that 20% of Americans make more than $180K a year. That's just ridiculous.

And I know a lot of people making more than in 2001, what does that prove?

It doesn't say 20% make more than $180k, it says 180K is the average for the top 20 %. That can be a very few making much more and a whole lot making less. It would be clearer as a mean or percentile, but it's not. :confused:

Spexxvet wrote:

...

In regards to the taxation issue. I can't find the resultant tax rate or tax dollars paid by these groups of folks. If your income is, say, $1 million, how much tax do you really pay? What percentage of their income does that represent? How much for the $51K to $75K range? What is their disposable income? I've searched for this info, but I can't seem to find what I'm looking for.

Here's the tax rate but what you pay is entirely up to you. How good you and your accountant are at playing the deduction game.

Undertoad wrote:

The US is best off when there is mobility: opportunity for the poor to become rich, no matter what the definition of those two things is.

One of the biggest factors creating a rich/poor "gap" is the Social Security system. SS is a regressive system that takes from the poor and gives to the rich.

How is it taking from the poor and giving to the rich? :confused:

xoxoxoBruce wrote:

... It doesn't say 20% make more than $180k, it says 180K is the average for the top 20 %. That can be a very few making much more and a whole lot making less. It would be clearer as a mean or percentile, but it's not. :confused:

Thanks, I misread it.

xoxoxoBruce wrote:

Here's the tax rate but what you pay is entirely up to you. How good you and your accountant are at playing the deduction game.

It's not entirely up to you. If one make's a big stock option gain, one gets taxed hard no matter what, short term, alt min. Then, after paying dues to join the club, one can set up all kinds of tax shelters.

But, looking at any single year for a taxpayer can be deceptive. Part of what I did resulted in overpaying Alt Min. A couple of years later, we had big medical deductions that took our taxable income to zero. Normally that would initate Alt Min, but we had credit towards that. So, we paid no federal taxes that year.

But this was from real losses, real past taxes paid, and real medical expenses. It wasn't exactly the "money growing on trees" scenario of popular myth.

Undertoad wrote:

The US is best off when there is mobility: opportunity for the poor to become rich, no matter what the definition of those two things is.

One of the biggest factors creating a rich/poor "gap" is the Social Security system. SS is a regressive system that takes from the poor and gives to the rich.

I agree that a chance for mobility is a good thing. Education is a key factor in that, and the truth remains that schools in the ghetto versus schools in wealthy suburbs give a very different quality of education.

I'm not quite sure of what you mean about the Social Security system either. Everyone pays into it, and at age 65 or if you become disabled, everyone draws from it, even those with private retirement/disability plans that give them a pretty good income. For example, I know of a disabled vet who gets almost $3,000/month from the VA and, in addition, draws an SSDI check for $730.00/month.

I think SS needs to be treated more like a sort of catastrophe insurance. If you have over a certain amount of income from other sources, you shouldn't be able to draw SS. I know most folks probably will disagree with me on this, but it would have the effect of making a big dent in the SS "crisis," as well as allow SS payments for those who truly need it to be raised to a more livable amount. Right now, a disabled person on SSI gets something like $570.00/month. Pretty pathetic. SSDI is somewhat better, I think people can get as much as $1200/month from that, but you have to luck out and meet the complex formula SSDI uses to figure your benefits.

Why SS is regressive.

One, your income under SS is only taxed to a certain point, about $90,000, and then it stops. You are not taxed above that point. Everyone under that exemption point is paying full percentage. Everyone who makes more than that is paying a lower percentage. People who make a ton more than that, pay a ton less.

Two, rich people live longer than poor people. A person who pays into the system their entire life, and then dies at age 65, is effectively hosed. Poor people are more likely to do that.

Three, rich people are more likely to be contractors and/or schedule C S-corporation or use other such practices to avoid paying the employer portion of the tax.

Four, rich people are more likely to put in close to the max their entire life which means they will take out close to the max during their entire senior years.

Undertoad wrote:

Why SS is regressive.

One, your income under SS is only taxed to a certain point, about $90,000, and then it stops. You are not taxed above that point. Everyone under that exemption point is paying full percentage. Everyone who makes more than that is paying a lower percentage. People who make a ton more than that, pay a ton less.

OK, if you make more than 90k you pay a smaller percentage but not less money. Likely more money than most.

Two, rich people live longer than poor people. A person who pays into the system their entire life, and then dies at age 65, is effectively hosed. Poor people are more likely to do that.

True

Three, rich people are more likely to be contractors and/or schedule C S-corporation or use other such practices to avoid paying the employer portion of the tax.

Ah, self employed, a unique problem most of us never face.

Four, rich people are more likely to put in close to the max their entire life which means they will take out close to the max during their entire senior years.

So you think they will collect more than they contributed therefore grab some of the money the poor people contributed before they died. Got it, thanks. :cool:

Rock Steady wrote:

It's not entirely up to you. If one make's a big stock option gain, one gets taxed hard no matter what, short term, alt min. Then, after paying dues to join the club, one can set up all kinds of tax shelters.

But, looking at any single year for a taxpayer can be deceptive. Part of what I did resulted in overpaying Alt Min. A couple of years later, we had big medical deductions that took our taxable income to zero. Normally that would initate Alt Min, but we had credit towards that. So, we paid no federal taxes that year.

But this was from real losses, real past taxes paid, and real medical expenses. It wasn't exactly the "money growing on trees" scenario of popular myth.

Your right of course, especially when it comes to unearned income or anything other than a straight wage.
I didn't mean to imply you could duck all taxes if you made big money. Just that those who do, will vary greatly in what they actually pay depending on the things I mentioned. It's hard to give 100k to a charity when you only make 20. :D