Do you have figures to show this "wealth mobility"? I have links to economist research that shows there isn't much at all.Hawke wrote:I'm for letting people keep as much of their money as possible and reject the notion of punishing the rich or class warfare brought on when there's incredible wealth mobility.
I do agree that tacking on a bunch of other crap to these bills is quite annoying. I guess it's part of the game. "If you won't play the way I want, I'll take my ball and go home."
We're running a huge deficit every year, which just piles things on top.I hate deficits, and while this wont add to what we're already at (because we've already been giving everyone that break) it wont help the situation either.
And if the stated goal is to "create jobs", then why not focus on the people who actually create those jobs: the employers. I like the idea of a payroll tax reduction since employers will be better able to hire people. Or credits for employers who hire someone who has been out of work for at least two months.
My big problem with things like that is while they sound good in theory, there will be some loophole that will be exploited by a company somewhere and Congress won't be able to get off their butts and close the loophole quickly enough.
Yeah, I was amused by something Sauder (spelling?) wrote recently. Apparently he is a constitutionalist, but considered the Constitution a "living document", meaning that it was up to future generations to define what the Constitution meant for them. It was some comment of his regarding how something being done now isn't in the document but when asked about his "living document" concept, he back-pedaled and agreed that maybe he'd spoken rashly. At least he admitted that he needed to give it more thought.The tax rate isn't the biggest issue but the out of control spending and expansion of federal government powers compared to what it should be (and constitutionally is).
Hm. It was probably done because of complexity. But with computers nowadays...And why the heck don't we have more tax brackets?
Well, for those types of businesses we have "income averaging" so that your income can be averaged over a 3-year period. My business isn't seasonal but it is sporadic. My wife and I can save about $2000 a year in business taxes by going through some extra work and putting specific dates into the tax forms as to when the money came in.... but not hurting the folks who might be making 200k in their last 5 years prior to retirement or those small businesses that really might be having a boom year but are in the red the next 3-4.
Well, it's a theory. It hasn't been proven. And in fact, the Bush years are a massive argument against it. (As I mentioned above, 4m jobs created during the period from 2003-2008, but 22.9m jobs during the Clinton years from 1993-2000. The range was chosen to coincide with when the tax rates were changed up to the next significant event.)And on the notion that lowering taxes can increase revenue... that's true...
But even that's not proof.
The CBO estimates that unemployment compensation is extremely "worth it". Every dollar paid out as UC generates up to $1.95 in economic activity. That's simply because people collecting UC spend every dime they make. And the stores where they spend their money, then turn around and spend the money again.
If the people collecting UC didn't need the money as much they'd simply put it into a bank account and forget about it. No activity there.
That's actually one thing that's been slowing down the economy's recovery: people have been saving. Credit card debt, car loan debt, and (one other type of debt I can't remember) have dropped significantly in the last two years. And that's bad for the economy. We need people to spend their money!
Heh-heh. Obviously if we eliminate all taxes, the government would have infinite revenue!but if you're lowering taxes and increasing revenue, you haven't lowered taxes enough! (I think Milton Friedman said that).