The Occupy Movement

[Dragonitti]

Here is the graph I found a long time ago, but more in detail on this page.


http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2...ilded-age.html


In 1928 the top 1% earned 23.94% of the Nations Income....

...BAM Great Depression

1953-1973 it was flat

Regan years came in 83' and the Top income tax rate was lowered

Top started banking in more again....2007 Subprime Mortgage set off another recession to which the Top 1% were bring in 23.5% of Nations Income

The top 1 percent of American earners controls as much of the nation’s total income as it did on the eve of the Great Depression. Now, however, their money comes from skyrocketing paychecks more than from unearned income, as it did in 1928.

This is what OWS protestors have to fuse about, among other issues.

[Dimman]

Don't pin this on the wealthy. Pin it on the elite.

All the elite may be wealthy, but not all the wealthy are elite.

[Dragonitti]

Originally Posted by Dimman

Don't pin this on the wealthy. Pin it on the elite.

All the elite may be wealthy, but not all the wealthy are elite.

Pinned on Corporations that buy our politicians. It just so happen, the Rich are the CEO's and CTO and higher ups of those Corps. Pinned on the Gov. for being run by the $ of the Corps. Pinned on the abundance of fake ass politicians who have no interest in being "for the people" but being for their wallet. Pinned on the politicians who go along with the wrong plan just for the sake of bi-partisanship. Sometimes you just got to say, FU it won't work like that. It's not soley pinned on the rich, but history shows that we perhaps should refrain from giving them 20+% of the nations income.

I am so Not a Republican (as a whole, they are greedy-cut throats imo) and I am not much of a Democrat these days either since they are just lap puppies to Republicans. Guess that makes me an independent.

[Dave-ROR]

Originally Posted by Dragonitti

When I started making $52k a year, I got a letter telling me I've entered another tax bracket and how % of taxes paid would increase. Didn't phase me. What person would look at themselves and say...Oh, I better not try and earn any more money because I will get more in taxes....No one. You going to continue to rise in income level. I'm expected to be around the $70k range within the next 6-12months and my field taps out around $120k yr. Would you fear getting a better job paying $100k yr just because you will get more taxes taken out on you than when you were getting 25k yr working at the call center when you were 18? Answer is no. So, it makes no sense to me that if you are pushing $250k that you should be paying less in % of income tax.

Regardless of what Warren Buffet is taxed on, the Rich are still paying LESS in % taxes than the middle class.

You are still far from the next bracket. If your income is 70, you likely have multiple deductions that are pretax, so your taxable income is still quite a bit less than 70.

Without deductions I'm just over another tax level and would lose a few thousand in takehome without those deductions, it'll happen eventually, not worried.

In theory everyone can lower their average tax income percentage through long term investments but obviously the more you invest the more benefit you get in terms of capital gains taxes lowering your average taxes.

Example, if you made 100k taxable income only, you'd pay $21,617 in taxes (tax rate of 21.617%). If you made that same 100k taxable income, but also made 100k in long term capital gains taxes you'd pay $36,617 in taxes, but, that tax rate is now 18.3085% because of the long term capital gains tax rate of 15%. If you made that same 100k but made 200k in long term capital gains you'd pay $51,617 in taxes, which is a tax rate of 17.2057%.

That's obviously a simple look at it and we'll assume no losses.

So, yes, the tax laws favor investments. Should the capital gains tax be based on the same scale as income/wages, maybe, but the end fact is that the more you make in WAGES the more taxes you pay % on those WAGES.

Everyone pays the same rate on long term capital gains (well some pay zero percent if your total income including capital gains are less than $34501.00).

Short term is taxes federally as regular income so if all of Buffets investment income was short term he would be paying 35% tax rates across the board... but obviously they are not short term.

I understand your point, but if you change that it will affect investors who are just starting out a lot more than people like Buffet (by affect I dont' mean % or dollar amounts, but the point of the lower capital gain taxes is to encourage long term investments, remove that and why would anyone but the super rich bother investing?).

Again, IMO we need to focus on real problems. If we didn't bleed money we could LOWER EVERYONES taxes. We need to REDUCE government spending and waste more than we need to increase taxes on the rich (and or everyone else).

[Dimman]

Originally Posted by Dragonitti

Pinned on Corporations that buy our politicians. It just so happen, the Rich are the CEO's and CTO and higher ups of those Corps. Pinned on the Gov. for being run by the $ of the Corps. Pinned on the abundance of fake ass politicians who have no interest in being "for the people" but being for their wallet. Pinned on the politicians who go along with the wrong plan just for the sake of bi-partisanship. Sometimes you just got to say, FU it won't work like that.

I am so Not a Republican and I am not much of a Democrat these days either since they are just lap puppies to Republicans. Guess that makes me an independent.

Yes, the Elite. They are different than someone that starts up a company and busts his balls, innovates and creates jobs, to make his money. This type of wealthy person is different from the rich corporate CEO guys donating (bribing) to politicians to legislate so they can get what they want more easily (usually at the cost of exporting jobs).

The problem is what keeps the first type of guy from becoming the second type?

[Dragonitti]

Originally Posted by Dave-ROR

You are still far from the next bracket. If your income is 70, you likely have multiple deductions that are pretax, so your taxable income is still quite a bit less than 70.

Didn't say I was entering another tax bracket from 52 to 70. I said when I hit 52 I went to another bracket and got a letter for it.

Originally Posted by Dimman

Yes, the Elite. They are different than someone that starts up a company and busts his balls, innovates and creates jobs, to make his money. This type of wealthy person is different from the rich corporate CEO guys donating (bribing) to politicians to legislate so they can get what they want more easily (usually at the cost of exporting jobs).

The problem is what keeps the first type of guy from becoming the second type?

Yeah, but those aren't the guys jacking up the system. Those guys starting companies are far and few.

Did I mention I hate politics?

[Dimman]

Originally Posted by Dave-ROR

This is true and false.

Buffet and other super wealthy make the vast majority of their income on long term investments/capital gains and not wages. So yes, they pay less % but only because of the investments. They pay MORE on wages.

Changing capital gain tax structures also hurt everyone, but people who live paycheck to paycheck aren't investing in the market either so you can say it's structured to help the wealthy I suppose.

This has gotten out of hand as well.

Initially it made sense as a way for startup companies to raise capital, and the investors have a reasonable right to make some money on the risk they take.

But now with how they fiddle with value and time, it has begun to look like a lot of it is based on an Emperor's New Clothes-type model. People are making a ton of money on the illusion of value. Has this changed since it was so seriously exposed with the mortgage crisis? That almost looks like a long-term pump and dump scam in retrospect.

[serialk11r]

Dragonitti, correlation does not imply causation. What you may be onto however is the phenomenon of a very small portion of people who understand what's going on (not necessarily corrupt) who cash in on the periods before recessions. Unfortunately this has to do with not enough people being well informed about what happens in the financial world.

Dimman, corporations don't need to muck with politicians to export jobs and cut costs :P Jobs going overseas is more like economics doing its thing. Doing sketchy business out of the country is possibly the more honest work of some organizations!

Government controls too much of our finances in this country, so everyone expects Uncle Sam to be helping them out. When I read about politics, it always feels like everyone is desperate to get a bigger cut of the pie for themselves, rich or poor. Whatever happened to self determination? Free market? When the government picks certain people/groups to support, that's not fair competition...

[kwnate]

Originally Posted by Dragonitti

I am so Not a Republican (as a whole, they are greedy-cut throats imo)

You say that like it's a bad thing. People should worry more about what they want there life to be and how they can get there instead of hating on people that have more. You're going to have to earn it, the strongest will survive and it sounds like you're on the right path. Don't let anyone bring you down or make you feel bad for having more than them. You don't owe them anything.

[Dimman]

Originally Posted by serialk11r

Dragonitti, correlation does not imply causation. What you may be onto however is the phenomenon of a very small portion of people who understand what's going on (not necessarily corrupt) who cash in on the periods before recessions. Unfortunately this has to do with not enough people being well informed about what happens in the financial world.

Dimman, corporations don't need to muck with politicians to export jobs and cut costs :P Jobs going overseas is more like economics doing its thing. Doing sketchy business out of the country is possibly the more honest work of some organizations!

Government controls too much of our finances in this country, so everyone expects Uncle Sam to be helping them out. When I read about politics, it always feels like everyone is desperate to get a bigger cut of the pie for themselves, rich or poor. Whatever happened to self determination? Free market? When the government picks certain people/groups to support, that's not fair competition...

There are protectionist issues such as tariffs and 'dumping' type issues, that for some reason the USA has no issue sticking it to Canada (despite sharing a free trade agreement) with over lumber, yet will completely look the other way on US manufacturing companies running overseas and taking US jobs and US gov't taxes with them. The hypocrisy shows that there is clearly some kind of collusion going on.

[Dragonitti]

Originally Posted by serialk11r

Dragonitti, correlation does not imply causation. What you may be onto however is the phenomenon of a very small portion of people who understand what's going on (not necessarily corrupt) who cash in on the periods before recessions. Unfortunately this has to do with not enough people being well informed about what happens in the financial world.

Dimman, corporations don't need to muck with politicians to export jobs and cut costs :P Jobs going overseas is more like economics doing its thing. Doing sketchy business out of the country is possibly the more honest work of some organizations!

Government controls too much of our finances in this country, so everyone expects Uncle Sam to be helping them out. When I read about politics, it always feels like everyone is desperate to get a bigger cut of the pie for themselves, rich or poor. Whatever happened to self determination? Free market? When the government picks certain people/groups to support, that's not fair competition...

You do understand that I'm not the one who correlated or drew this causation of this data right? The data is correlated by industry experts and analyst, not me. Political Analyst themselves drew this correlation and causation. Do I believe them...Pretty sure the data has merit.

http://www.youtube.com/user/TheYoung.../0/IyJIGlInJnk

The Gov. tried to do something about those companies outsourcing all of the jobs to foreign employment, which I greatly agreed with. Those corporations then turned around and found loop holes in other areas to beat the system.

Originally Posted by kwnate

You say that like it's a bad thing. People should worry more about what they want there life to be and how they can get there instead of hating on people that have more. You're going to have to earn it, the strongest will survive and it sounds like you're on the right path. Don't let anyone bring you down or make you feel bad for having more than them. You don't owe them anything.

Not every Republican is wealthy. When I speak of Greed, it extends further than monetary value. I haven't seen a single republican that I agreed with on their values and beliefs. It has nothing to do with them having more or less than what I do though. Just wanted to clarify that. I can't be apart of anything that has people like Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck...etc

Their positions have a lot of racial tone and undertones to them when they deliver messages.



http://www.youtube.com/user/TheYoung.../6/f1I_BD5jAE4


http://www.youtube.com/user/TheYoung...20/qztS34TI-30

[Dragonitti]

Classic An Coulter

http://www.youtube.com/user/TheYoung.../0/VVt7dRZLi_w

[serialk11r]

Okay I just watched those videos, which don't say anything by the way, and you are still missing the point, but whatever. Not going to argue anymore.

Taxing the rich btw, is not going to erase our debt. Certainly, I think we can afford to levy a bit more capital gains tax and all, but you can't tax actual wealth, or else people will just send their money overseas. The amount that the government owes far exceeds the wealth of the "1%", or even the wealth of "the 10%". There's no simple way out of this. I think we're kinda screwed :/

[fatoni]

Originally Posted by Dragonitti

You do understand that I'm not the one who correlated or drew this causation of this data right? The data is correlated by industry experts and analyst, not me. Political Analyst themselves drew this correlation and causation. Do I believe them...Pretty sure the data has merit.

http://www.youtube.com/user/TheYoung.../0/IyJIGlInJnk

The Gov. tried to do something about those companies outsourcing all of the jobs to foreign employment, which I greatly agreed with. Those corporations then turned around and found loop holes in other areas to beat the system.





Not every Republican is wealthy. When I speak of Greed, it extends further than monetary value. I haven't seen a single republican that I agreed with on their values and beliefs. It has nothing to do with them having more or less than what I do though. Just wanted to clarify that. I can't be apart of anything that has people like Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck...etc

Their positions have a lot of racial tone and undertones to them when they deliver messages.



http://www.youtube.com/user/TheYoung.../6/f1I_BD5jAE4


http://www.youtube.com/user/TheYoung...20/qztS34TI-30

while i wouldnt say im a democrat, living in orange county kinda makes me hate republicans. at least the ones i meet. they are perpetually bitching about stuff quoting those radical tea party notions. they act outraged at the 99%, who seem to have no problem asking the 1% for car loans and jobs but are disgusted when they get their money back, and how they just kinda loiter while the tea party is named after the most famous act of treason, arson, murder, theft, etc. in the history of our country.

i do however think there could be focus on other aspects of whats going on. like why american companies are taxed on money they make outside of the country? if they want to bring money into the country they should be able to do it for free. or why is the government subsidizing tobacco and paying for all these anti smoking commercials? just pick one and run with it.