i dunno either but i have a hard time believing that the rich actually pay less taxes percentage-wise, given the way income tax works. i know warren buffet famously claimed that he pays less than his secretary. i would argue that buffett is a very special case, and incredible money manager that makes relatively none of his income from a salary. and i am also not convinced that capital gains should be taxed heavily, for the reaons mentioned earlier. investment should be encouraged and money should not be taxed twice. i think we should concentrate on lowering spending, i worry that spreading this idea that the rich do not pay enough will result in higher income taxes for the rich, which would damage the economy. actually i dont think it matters who is taxed, i think it hurts everyone. i dont think it helps the poor when the rich are taxed, i think it hurts them.
it helps the poor if the rich are taxed instead, but sure if theyre just adding it on top of taxes to the poor.
These foreign profits are currently not taxable if they are kept offshore. I'm sure this is billions of dollars in profits that go untaxed. I am also sure that most of the multinationals that are using this method of tax avoidance are also paying buttloads in taxes domestically. I seriously doubt that very many multinationals can get rid of their entire liability employing this method, and once again this is just corporate income tax. These companies are paying out the bum on ues taxes, payroll taxes, permits, and the like. Your notion that often times corporations pay no taxes is still off base to me.
The point is that conservatives complain about the number of workers who don't pay taxes, mostly because they don't earn enough to owe any, yet see no issue that a large number of corporations also pay no taxes for the same reason. Worse, corporations are using multinational connections to avoid paying US taxes and worse than that, foreign corporations operating in the US pay even less US taxes.
When you failed to vote you lost your right to complain. The only vote that is wasted is the one that is not used.
I consider myself a conservative but I disagree with what you are saying. I really don't have a problem with someone who makes 12 grand a year not paying any taxes. I do have a problem with some of the programs that give them money when no effort is being made to do any better. And I do have a problem with taxing corporations to pay for these programs and other spending. Conservatives focus on taxes but the root of their (our) thinking is reduction of wasteful spending, therefore eliminating the need for high taxes.
In addition to capital gains tax versus payroll tax, a big part of the reason why is tax avoidance. Rich people set up companies so that they do not pay taxes on much of their income as it is a "business expense" or they use depreciation & other factors to drive their taxable income much lower than it otherwise would be. This is completely legal, as it should be. Of course you're not convinced. No one will ever convince you to raise taxes on anything because you'll always believe that the answer is on the other side. And you're right, but unfortunately that's not how politics work. Also, I haven't gone into, but it could be argued that the "poor" pay more in taxes as a % of income because of sales tax & the fact that they spend a much higher portion of their income just to live as oppossed to the rich.
