Your definition of rich is kind of low, don't you think. $100,000? Are you serious? Trust me, pulling $100,000 ain't rich anymore, ask SabanFan. :wink: It ain't even upper middle class anymore. The average hard-working white-collar worker in America retires a millionaire and it barely provides a comfortable retirement. I'm talking about that top 1% that makes 22% of the income. What I'm saying is that dividends and capital gains income, which is what they mostly make their income on, should NOT be taxed lower than the salaries that the true middle class makes their income from. They don't deserve this break. Hard-working earners such as you describe are not targeted by this, their dividend and capital gains income is small.
And what I don't understand is, why do intelligent, hard working americans either ignore this fact, or just allow themselves to be convinced by elected officials that this is a good thing.
I guess I am defining rich as someone who makes more than the income cutoff for the middleclass quoted as high as $100,000. As for the retiree millionaire, I see part of that being due to inflation; the other being due to pension fund withdrawals taxed as ordinary income, including social security. That hurts. I still maintain that instead of having money put into social security by the government pre-tax, and having all gains tax deferred until withdrawal when all long term gains are taxed as ordinary income including the money originally put into social security, one can do better by just having the same money taxed and then having the long term gains taxed at a lower long term gain rate. The Roth IRA is one of the best deals ever offered by the government for the working people, instead of the 401K. If you say the rich should be taxed at higher capital gains rates, wouldn't that torpedo any investment incentives and therefore curtail the stimulus for any job creation? Surely, you are not counting on government for job creation! And I do not think the lower capital gain rates specifically give the rich a "break" . It applies to anyone , from whatever strata in society,who puts in money and hence takes the risk for investments. IF the cap gains rates were to be raised to ord. income levels, that will have a drastic impact on this country's economic engine, not to mention cutting down foreign money investments.
Why should it? What are they going to do--stop investing and bury their money in coffee cans? Where is the evidence that saving the rich from paying taxes actually creates any jobs. I just don't see it. I'm not counting on corporate fat cats to do it either, they are all outsourcing work overseas! Yes, but those that make 90% of their income from investments get a huge break over those of us who make 10% of their income from investments and the rest from salaries, taxed at the highest rate. Don't think in terms of you losing a few hundred bucks to Uncle Sam from your small capital gains, think in terms of the super-rich paying the same high rate you must pay on your salary on their huge capital gains. How? Why? They were at those levels once before and America enjoyed the worlds biggest economy and prosperity was the highest ever.
