Gee, I can't wait to pay my taxes

OnDborder

Ya right, believe the "official" spin(lie) again.. How many times do you have to be lied to?
At the time,, what Iraqi goverment?
There wasn't any "goverment". Who was in charge? US?
Where did the cash go? Where's the papertrail?
To say it was "the Iraqi's money" is a cop-out. It should have been used to reimburse us for liberating their asses..

Also,, do you all really think that the profits for the oil are going to go to the American taxpayer or the Iraqi people?? Duh, my bet is the profits are going to be made by the oil companies. 1 part of 3 why we invaded, illegally, in the first place.

OnDborder

Actually I was being sarcastic in my title..

cozumel

The missing $100,000,000 was Iraqi money held by the UN from 'Oil for Food' deal. The audit that is currently under investigation did not include further money earmarked for reconstuction that came directly from US.

The oil companies are American and therefore any profits goes back in to US economy.

Whether the war was illegal or not is a matter for another thread. If we start going down that road in this thread then this'll end up as yet another 'US against the world' style thread and would drift off-topic.

SFOSOK

Anyone who buttf*cks their own country killing civilians and destroying resources does not deserve to be in power.

Sandok

And where did I ever say the opposite?

Anyways, under that defination many other countries should be soon at war too no?

SFOSOK

I never made the assumption that you said the opposite, just simply stating what I believe on the matter.

I'm guessin those countries wont be too far away from war, not just because of the US.

Maddogg6

I think the current tax system is fairest (for the most part - its all those little known 'loopholes' that screw us most - IMO)... because stores charge the same for a gal of milk no matter what - so those in destitute are less likely to afford the means to survive if it were a flat tax or a flat rate (%).

Now I thought I heard it was more like 8 BILLION missing/unaccounted for? - regardless...

What REALLY pissed me off is I read a quote from the guy that was hired to do the accounting said something like; 'its not US tax dollars, so who cares'
Well, heres why I care - those Iraqis were screwed - who do you think they will blame?? US, thats who - not iraqi's or their banking systems. The individuals now have more reason to hate infidels and will most assuredly be yet more motivation for 'jihad' against us. What an idiot this 'ex-admiral' is for saying such an ignorant thing - we took it, and allowed *some* to steal it.
He should be shot for treason.

Pompey

slightly OT but dont americans pay seperate taxes to heaps of different governments eg federal, state, county, city etc?

DudeBoyz

Yes.

We pay taxes through the nose. It's pretty burdensome to many citizens.

Federal
State Income Tax
State Sales Tax
County Sales Tax (on top of State costs)
City Sales Tax (on top of State and County costs)
City Income Tax (New York, for example)
Gas Tax (at every pump, varies state to state, county to county, city to city)
Utilities Tax (Natural Gas, Electricity, Sewer, Water, telephone, cell phone, cable TV, etc)
Property Tax
School Levy Tax (local)
County Library Tax
City Library Tax
Hotel / Motel Tax
Car Licensing Tax
Vehicle Weight Tax
Road and Bridge Tolls
National / State Park Fees
Parking Fees

I'm probably not even brushing the top. There are bound to be many more that I have simply overlooked.

Sandok

Yeah but what counts is the total % of tax on your salary... Who cares if it's alot of people you gotta pay, tis the total amount that counts.

And honestly, when I was in the US, taxes were far from being extreme... Canada is even worse off, and you haven't even visited Nordic countries

DudeBoyz

40%-50% going to taxes overall is not uncommon. When I first started working my way up the ladder, what shocked me the most was the more that I made, the higher my percentage. It bordered on being a deterrent to accepting promotions. In fact, making the move from Hourly, who was elligible for Overtime, to Salaried, I lost thousands of dollars each year for the first few before breaking even again, and finally moving beyond that.

Federal Income Tax alone, back in the 70's was over 70% for millionaires. They ended up saving a great deal of money hiring lawyers to help them avoid paying taxes than actually paying the taxes themselves.

Thankfully, top tax rates federally are now below 40%, so that is something positive.

Dowaco

I have always thought that a graduated tax was unfair. If the US is truly about everyone being equal, then everyone should pay the same tax regardless of income. We all get the same access to benefits, we are all protected by the courts, police, fire department and military.
There are way too many entitlements that have swollen the size of government from its intended purpose of establishing justice, insuring domestic tranquility, providing for the common defense, and promoting the general welfare.

Promoting the general welfare does not mean welfare for a select group who do not have jobs, it means the quality of life in general.
If the taxes that are collected in this way are not enough to run the country, then cut out the fat and get back to less government. If people need help with life then they should join a church.

I am in favor of paying for things that you use. If you have a car then pay gas tax and tolls, if you have children, then pay school taxes. Privatize garbage collection, have real estate taxes for home owners.

Soaking people who have gotten an education to see a better life, or work their butts off in two jobs should not be the way to collect taxes to feed a bloated government that hands out and wastes billions like it was water.

We don't need the government, the government needs us to survive. And they survive and grow stronger like a vampire sucking the life blood from the citizens of the country.

DudeBoyz

Theoretically, I agree with you.

Realistically, if that was so, the poor would get hit with a much higher burden than they already have, and society would turn into a bunch of elite aristocrats with people yelling "Let Them Eat Cake!" and it would get ugly.

At least I think it a good possibility.

Dowaco

Thats only if you accept that we need to collect hundreds of billions of dollars from the population to maintain the bloated federal monster. Corporations could pay more taxes, and the govermnment could get smaller.

There might not be a need for personal federal income tax at all. Why not let the states collect all taxes and then ante up to the federal level to maintain a United States like the name implies.

DudeBoyz

There is a place somewhere in between.

Zelig

Everyone doesn't get the same benefits though. People with money for a vehicle benefit more from roads, people with more property benefit from property rights, people with more expensive lawyers benefit more from the legal system... I could go on listing examples. In general, wealthier individuals use more equal quality services than poor ones.

DudeBoyz

People with money often get preferential treatment, and can afford better doctors, better legal reputation and the like. While I'm not interested in a wealth grab, I do wish we had a more even distribution. I don't know how best to do that, however. I'm just not well versed enough in all the details to be capable of rendering a solution.

Yousaif

Well I have seen that more times than I care to admit. The problem with taxing corporations more is complex.

If corporations pay more in taxes they have less money to pay their employees (though lately it seems that a lot of them are more worried about how little they can pay their emplyees and still keep them)

Corporations make products. Those products eother go directly to consumers (like clothing) or to other corporations to produce other products (like the automatic loom that weaves the cotton into the fabric to make the clothes). All items that go into the production of a product show up in the final price, and this includes the taxes they need to pay in order to stay in business. In the end, its really not the corporations that pay the taxes, but the consumers of their products. In the end its us, the little guys, that buy the XBox 360's, that buy the PS3's, that buy the new television or the new pair of jeans that pay the taxes.

Dowaco also said that governement needs to shrink, and that is the understatement of the century. WHen we sit in our homes and realize that our income won't cover the expenses that we have planned for the month what do we do? We lower our planned expenses. We don't give ourselves a raise, we don't go to our boss and tell them that we need a raise (even though we probably do), we make do with less than what we would like to make ends meet.

Making ends meet and living within your means is a concept lost on the government of the US. I can't speak for other countries, but I wouldn't doubt that this is the same there as well. --please note this is not a cue to start a debate oh which governments do and do not live within their means--

This quote is taken from: Citizens Against Government Waste: Homepage, for more information about unnecessary spending please visit that site.

I could do a lot with $29 billion, but I don't think I would $1,000,000 for the Waterfree Urinal Conservation Initiative.

Its not just the pork spending, though. The government spends more money on services that are offered by more than one department that it isn't even funny. If you feel like reading the entire budget for FY2007, go here http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget...7/pdf/spec.pdf

And don't forget, that until we change the government's definition of "spending cut," we won't get anywhere. The current definition of a spending cut is "a smaller increase than we got last year."

Pathetic.

Zelig

This isn't always true. In the case of luxury goods, it's possible to tax the corporations. If they don't lower their prices to compensate, people buy less goods, and the corporations make less money. The opposite is also true, it's possible for taxes (or stuff like employment insurance) that are supposed to be paid by corporations to be paid almost entirely by consumers.

Unfortunately, politicians concentrate on policies which will get them votes, not on sound economic policies.

Dowaco

Obviously this is true. Which is why I offered a pay as you go solution. If you have a car then you pay more taxes for gas, tolls, luxury tax etc. Land owners already pay property taxes based on the value of the land.
But wealthy citizens cannot get food stamps or subsidized housing or free medical care. These are things that the local community or churches used to provide to the down and out through donations and volunteers.

Everyone gets one vote. If you are going to tax people based on how much they make, rich people should get more votes since they are contributing more to the coffers. Sounds silly, but taxing successful people to enable the unsuccessful is counter-darwinian and leads to mediocrity.

cozumel

1. Someone who holds down three jobs just to feed their family is probably more physically and mentally exhausted than an individual who has got rich in, let's say' the IT industry. The three children of the poorer individual stand far less chance due to reduced opportunities, a lower quality education and health system.
2. Some individuals earn ridiculous amounts of money for doing nothing. Paris Hilton just to name one. The Beckhams. CEOs of big business earn far more than their physical labor is worth.
3. When you're earning, off the top of my head, in excess of $1,000,000 every month including bonuses, share options etc and not contributing to the welfare of society then you're missing the point of humanity.
4. Equal taxes does not mean that you are enriching the lives of those less fortunate who only just make ends meet. It means that their hardship only increases.

Caring for those that require support to lead a full and happy life is what makes us different from other species on this planet. Redistribution of wealth is one way that this can be done.

All of the above sentiments apply on a global level.

This was a party political webcast on behalf of the 'Subliminal Thoughts Party'

Maddogg6

Isnt this concept part of socialism - either way - doesnt it require more trust to be put into the hands of our elected officials? (4 for me - 1 for you). So im not in love with this idea...

The part about waste seems like a bigger problem than tax rates IMO.

But all this is a simply a side effect of people not paying attention to what their representatives are doing on their behalf.

I have a friend, whos mom voted for Bill Clinton for 1 stupid reason - 'hes an attractive man'. And she wasn't a simple minded house wife or anything - but a hospital administrator. This mentality, to me - is THE biggest problem of them all. Apathetic America.

cozumel

Very true. But hey...what's in a label? We could rename 'redist of wealth' into something else more pallatable.


Ignorance of what democracy is and means is a massive obstacle. There's a quote - 'Wisdom speaks, intelligence listens.'