Obama Cuts Taxes?

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
41

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Aragorn wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]ZEB wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:
Shit, tax cuts for the rich is nothing more than another entitlement program at this point.[/quote]

I don’t understand that comment. The more people get to keep THERE money the better. It matters not whether they be rich or middle class. Besides the rich pay something like 70% of all taxes.
[/quote]

I’d like to see taxes lowered across the board, but this is not the time to do so. The country as a whole has to make some sacrifices, and it is the rich who are best in position to do this. Besides, ending the Bush-era tax cuts isn’t really a raise in taxes as much as it is a return to a previous level. They’ll still be much lower than they have been in general in the last 50 years.
…
We are slowly turning into a two-class system at the expense of the middle class and at the expense of future generations. It is the lower and middle classes that NEED the tax cuts. The rich will be just fine paying 38% instead of 33% or whatever the figures are. But the lower and middle classes would not be. We are a service-based economy now, and regardless of what tax rates the rich pay, they will continue to use and enjoy these “services” because they can afford to, whereas it is the lower and middle classes who will be forced to curtail their use of these services. Like I said before, I’d like to see taxes cut for everyone, but it is just too unrealistic to expect NOW to be the time to do so. I think Warren Buffett was right in his assessment of these tax cuts/hikes.[/quote]

Well, see, the Bush tax cuts didn’t just cut taxes for the “rich”. They also cut taxes for everyone else. So an expiration of the Bush cuts hurts EVERYONE, not just the people who can afford it. I think you will agree that the very last thing we need in a frail economy is to hurt the “little guy” who’s already taking the brunt of the downturn anyways.

It took Obama a long-ass time to come to grips with this, and admit it, but he finally did (“[this solution] is not perfect but… it will stop middle-class taxes from going up.” NY Times today). What is funny is that if he had let the tax cuts expire he would be in direct violation of one of his campaign promises–not to “raise taxes” on middle-income ppl/families. (not that campaign promise violations are anything new). This of his shows 1 of 2 things: either a) he knew it would raise taxes on middle income families and he was still advocating it anyways–thus purposely breaking his campaign promise, or b) he didn’t know and had sense knocked into him about breaking his campaign promises.

I personally think it was option a. The man may be inexperienced, but I don’t think he’s stupid–he had to know the tax cut affected all brackets.

Also, this is a good political move for him at the moment. He may spin this as him being a man willing to reach across the aisle. If his party rebels and still fights it, they’ll pay further in seats because they will be seen as the villains even more than they already were.[/quote]

I understand that the tax cuts were for everyone and not just the rich. But that top 5% getting a tax cut means a loss of 800 billion in revenue a year. This is going to represent a larger and larger loss of revenue each year. Essentially extending the tax cuts to the rich is an expenditure. It’s spending on an entitlement program, to stretch things a bit.

[/quote]

Not to discredit your post, but numbers do matter:

Obama stressed that he didn’t like two elements of the deal – the temporary extension of tax cuts for upper-income Americans, which he said would have cost $700 billion if stretched for the entire next decade, and making the estate tax exemption more generous for the same time period.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/theoval/post/2010/12/obama-addresses-possible-deal-on-bush-tax-cuts/1

42

[quote]Tex Ag wrote:
Can someone explain to me why if we move/return responsibilities to the States, like education, our taxes will go down? The States will need to either replenish the revenues they were receiving from the Feds. or every school is going to take a major financial cut. So, raise local taxes, either sales or property.[/quote]

Public ed, which is a waste of money, will be phased out. The state will just regulate. This is good. Why should people with no kids pay someone else’s bills anyway? Fuck that. Let 'em pay for their own education.

43

One of the real issues with govt spending is how a budget works. Quite simply, an office losses its funding if it does not spend all of its money. It is not allowed to save for future expenditures that do not occur every year, like upgrading technology. So, there is a rush to spend everything to try and keep funding and some extra money if the need arises.

There are thousands (if not hundred of thousands) of govt offices (universities work this way as well) that are spending money needlessly at the end of the year to meet the demand of the budget. So basically, I am saying the fundamental way we account for govt spending leads to bloated expenditures. We can argue where to cut spending, but honestly, the real savings would be in developing a system that rewards, rather than punishes, cost savings.

Sorry if not sexy.

44

[quote]Aragorn wrote:
Another point I think Ratchet brought up–cut staffing.

Companies pay attention to efficiency. They may be evil, unjust and oppressive (Ryan McCarter), but with the exception of venture capital firms and various hedge fund/investment banking companies they a) work to be as efficient as possible and b) manage risk. The vast, vast majority of successful service and industrial companies do this. If the gov’t were run more along a company’s financial lines you’d have a helluva lot less waste. Problem is, that’s “hard”. And it requires stepping on toes of people who think they’re entitled, not the least of which are the politicians.[/quote]

How about cutting govt subsidies to farmers? I live right smack in the middle of the Central Valley. I can tell you right now that most farmers out here are filthy rich, not some Auntie Em and Uncle Henry, Mom-and-Pop outfit struggling to remain above water. On top of that, why should taxpayers subsidize farmers who grow marginal crops like walnuts or almonds? We don’t need that shit to survive, we need corn, wheat, stuff like that.

But we pay farmers to not only grow these things, we sometimes pay them to NOT grow in certain years to keep prices stable. Plus, rice farmers are the biggest polluters of the state’s waterways BY FAR. Yet we essentially pay them to do so. Why?

45

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Aragorn wrote:
Another point I think Ratchet brought up–cut staffing.

Companies pay attention to efficiency. They may be evil, unjust and oppressive (Ryan McCarter), but with the exception of venture capital firms and various hedge fund/investment banking companies they a) work to be as efficient as possible and b) manage risk. The vast, vast majority of successful service and industrial companies do this. If the gov’t were run more along a company’s financial lines you’d have a helluva lot less waste. Problem is, that’s “hard”. And it requires stepping on toes of people who think they’re entitled, not the least of which are the politicians.[/quote]

How about cutting govt subsidies to farmers? I live right smack in the middle of the Central Valley. I can tell you right now that most farmers out here are filthy rich, not some Auntie Em and Uncle Henry, Mom-and-Pop outfit struggling to remain above water. On top of that, why should taxpayers subsidize farmers who grow marginal crops like walnuts or almonds? We don’t need that shit to survive, we need corn, wheat, stuff like that.

But we pay farmers to not only grow these things, we sometimes pay them to NOT grow in certain years to keep prices stable. Plus, rice farmers are the biggest polluters of the state’s waterways BY FAR. Yet we essentially pay them to do so. Why?[/quote]

OMG. I agree.

46

[quote]MaximusB wrote:
The idea that this is a tax cut is pure bullshit.

This has been the tax rate for the past 9 years, so changing it would be a tax increase. So in theory, Obama is not raising taxes.

We do not have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem, [/quote]

Well said and exactly right.

47

[quote]kamui wrote:
your taxes should be inversely proportional to the number of working children you have. [/quote]

Poppycock.

48

[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Aragorn wrote:
Another point I think Ratchet brought up–cut staffing.

Companies pay attention to efficiency. They may be evil, unjust and oppressive (Ryan McCarter), but with the exception of venture capital firms and various hedge fund/investment banking companies they a) work to be as efficient as possible and b) manage risk. The vast, vast majority of successful service and industrial companies do this. If the gov’t were run more along a company’s financial lines you’d have a helluva lot less waste. Problem is, that’s “hard”. And it requires stepping on toes of people who think they’re entitled, not the least of which are the politicians.[/quote]

How about cutting govt subsidies to farmers? I live right smack in the middle of the Central Valley. I can tell you right now that most farmers out here are filthy rich, not some Auntie Em and Uncle Henry, Mom-and-Pop outfit struggling to remain above water. On top of that, why should taxpayers subsidize farmers who grow marginal crops like walnuts or almonds? We don’t need that shit to survive, we need corn, wheat, stuff like that.

But we pay farmers to not only grow these things, we sometimes pay them to NOT grow in certain years to keep prices stable. Plus, rice farmers are the biggest polluters of the state’s waterways BY FAR. Yet we essentially pay them to do so. Why?[/quote]

OMG. I agree.[/quote]

MARK TODAY DOWN IN YOUR CALENDARS GENTLEMEN!!! TODAY IS A GREAT DAY INDEED!!!

No, but seriously this would be a great first step. I mean, yeah there’s all sorts of things to cut, but farm subsidies are in the tens of billions a year. And for what? Anywhere from 45-60% of the rice grown here in Cal is shipped out of the United States. Where does a lot of it go? North Korea and China of all places. So we’re paying them to grow a product that fucking annihilates our waterways (to the tune of 5-6$ per acre foot of water usage, compared to 5-6 grand per acre foot for non-farmers) while we are forced to pay extra in taxes to keep our state “green” so that China and NK get their rice. They only need our rice because things are completely backwards in NK and China has ruined so much of their own rice-growing fields from industrial pollution that they’re unusable. When NK blows up some nuke and we go to the table and promise aid in return for no more nuke testing, and then they do it again, what do you think we’re giving them? OUR rice.

We should cut govt farm subsidies out entirely, eliminate half of the rice fields in the valley to save our waterways, and tell multi-billionaires like Ken Hoffman (who owns a plurality of the agr. property in NorCal) to go fuck themselves. See, why should Ken Hoffman get a tax cut? We are essentially supporting a system with our tax dollars right now that keeps unnecessary farm land viable through what’s nothing more than agricultural welfare. We are lowering his taxes so that he can do what? Buy more farm land so that the taxpayer can subsidize meaningless crops like walnuts and pecans and persimmons and fund the polluting of our waterways?

Obviously this sort of scenario doesn’t hold true for all rich people, but whenever I hear people say that the rich make the country go 'round I think of this particular situation and laugh. The same sentiment applies to some of these fuckers at Citibank or Goldman Sachs or the bumbling, inept fools at GM who ran Pontiac or Buick into the ground.

49

[quote]Tex Ag wrote:
Can someone explain to me why if we move/return responsibilities to the States, like education, our taxes will go down? The States will need to either replenish the revenues they were receiving from the Feds. or every school is going to take a major financial cut. So, raise local taxes, either sales or property.[/quote]

I can explain it in one word, ready? Inefficiency Enough said.

50

[quote]ZEB wrote:

[quote]Tex Ag wrote:
Can someone explain to me why if we move/return responsibilities to the States, like education, our taxes will go down? The States will need to either replenish the revenues they were receiving from the Feds. or every school is going to take a major financial cut. So, raise local taxes, either sales or property.[/quote]

I can explain it in one word, ready? Inefficiency Enough said.[/quote]

Private?

51

[quote]DBCooper wrote:
But that top 5% getting a tax cut means a loss of 800 billion in revenue a year.[/quote]

Wrong way to look at it. It is an investment in broadening the tax base as the wealthy are the primary ones who actually begin and expand business. And for this they are continually punished by a government that believes that those who make a lot of money should hand a good portion of it over so that those who did not earn it can enjoy it. Wrong minded and harmful to the economy as well.

If that is what I wrote or how it sounded, it is not what I had intended. But within the context of our conversation the guy making 1 million is more important to the economy than the person making 50-k. So why are we punishing our biggest earners? If you owned a widget company would you punish or reward your best salesman? Government does almost everything wrong. So let’s at least make it smaller so that less people get hurt.

No, but the facts are most millionaires DID NOT inherit their wealth. There’s a good book called “The Millionaire Next Door.” In that book the author through a tremendous amount of research makes a case that over 85% of all millionaires earned it themselves. How? Through starting and operating some form of small business. They are not evil because they had the balls and the brains to start a business and succeed.

There’s that word “fair” again. One always has to be very suspicious of anyone using the word fairwhen it comes to a political end. You say it’s fairto take money from someone who earned it through the sweat of their brow and give it to someone who has done nothing to earn it, and I call that unfair. In addition to that if you took a look at the article that I posted it’s clear that tax breaks for everyone helps revenue and expands the economy. That helps EVERYONE, and I think that’s fair. What we need to do is to provide an economic environment which encourages people to start their own business, or invest in someone else’s via private equity or the public markets. Handing someone x amount of dollars harms the person that it was taken from and also the person it was given to.

Try to steer away from the social engineers who feel that taking someone’s money and giving it to someone else is fair,it’s anything but fair. And on top of that it hurts the economy and tells the person who is getting the “gift” that they are not good enough to earn it on their own - No one wins with this scenario.

Please think about it. Someday when you’re elected President I want you to make the righ t choices :slight_smile: (Oh and keep me in mind for the VP spot)

52

[quote]TBT4ver wrote:
and making the estate tax exemption more generous for the same time period.

[/quote]

Yes, heaven forbid that someone who has worked hard all his life and made a lot of money want to leave that wealth to their son or daughter. Much better that they give it to the state. The inheritance tax is perhaps one of the most evil (among a large group) taxes that exists.

53

[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:

[quote]ZEB wrote:

[quote]Tex Ag wrote:
Can someone explain to me why if we move/return responsibilities to the States, like education, our taxes will go down? The States will need to either replenish the revenues they were receiving from the Feds. or every school is going to take a major financial cut. So, raise local taxes, either sales or property.[/quote]

I can explain it in one word, ready? Inefficiency Enough said.[/quote]

Private?[/quote]

Possibly.

54

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Aragorn wrote:
Another point I think Ratchet brought up–cut staffing.

Companies pay attention to efficiency. They may be evil, unjust and oppressive (Ryan McCarter), but with the exception of venture capital firms and various hedge fund/investment banking companies they a) work to be as efficient as possible and b) manage risk. The vast, vast majority of successful service and industrial companies do this. If the gov’t were run more along a company’s financial lines you’d have a helluva lot less waste. Problem is, that’s “hard”. And it requires stepping on toes of people who think they’re entitled, not the least of which are the politicians.[/quote]

How about cutting govt subsidies to farmers? I live right smack in the middle of the Central Valley. I can tell you right now that most farmers out here are filthy rich, not some Auntie Em and Uncle Henry, Mom-and-Pop outfit struggling to remain above water. On top of that, why should taxpayers subsidize farmers who grow marginal crops like walnuts or almonds? We don’t need that shit to survive, we need corn, wheat, stuff like that.

But we pay farmers to not only grow these things, we sometimes pay them to NOT grow in certain years to keep prices stable. Plus, rice farmers are the biggest polluters of the state’s waterways BY FAR. Yet we essentially pay them to do so. Why?[/quote]

Natural result of involving government in the economy…its all evil.

(1) National defense (2) National police, like FBI (3) Fed Judiciary

Fire all others. Fire them all. Sell all their assets, pay off the debt.

55

I don’t understand many of you people, the ones who want to give our government more money to fuck off with.

Have you not seen, time and time again, that our government continually fucks the money off, right off a cliff, with little to nothing to show for it? I don’t care who is in office, who is driving this bitch, or who does more chest thumping thinking their ideas are better than the other party.

Here in California, we have full blown Socialism, yet are not reaping the “rewards” of Socialism. We have the highest taxes in every category, in every way, in the entire country, yet have the highest deficit, highest welfare contribution, some of the worst unemployment, worst business environment, costs of living, etc.

Honestly, what the fuck more do you need to look at to see how much FUBAR is involved when the government gets their claws on shit.

56

[quote]ZEB wrote:

[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:

[quote]ZEB wrote:

[quote]Tex Ag wrote:
Can someone explain to me why if we move/return responsibilities to the States, like education, our taxes will go down? The States will need to either replenish the revenues they were receiving from the Feds. or every school is going to take a major financial cut. So, raise local taxes, either sales or property.[/quote]

I can explain it in one word, ready? Inefficiency Enough said.[/quote]

Private?[/quote]

Possibly.[/quote]

So your saying that the federal govt is inefficient and state govt will be more efficient. So you think have fewer people doing the job in DC is more efficient than similar jobs replicated in each state. How?

As far as taxes, the states will still need to raise local taxes to make up some of the difference that the state would incur, yes? In places that draw in more tax dollars than they pay out to the feds would bear an increased cost, so those local taxes will need to be increased. Some place might actually do alright. But the state govt would still grow their education bureaucracy to deal with the increased responsibilities. And since each state will have to do this it is a jobs package as well?

57

[quote]Tex Ag wrote:

[quote]ZEB wrote:

[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:

[quote]ZEB wrote:

[quote]Tex Ag wrote:
Can someone explain to me why if we move/return responsibilities to the States, like education, our taxes will go down? The States will need to either replenish the revenues they were receiving from the Feds. or every school is going to take a major financial cut. So, raise local taxes, either sales or property.[/quote]

I can explain it in one word, ready? Inefficiency Enough said.[/quote]

Private?[/quote]

Possibly.[/quote]

So your saying that the federal govt is inefficient and state govt will be more efficient. So you think have fewer people doing the job in DC is more efficient than similar jobs replicated in each state. How?

As far as taxes, the states will still need to raise local taxes to make up some of the difference that the state would incur, yes? In places that draw in more tax dollars than they pay out to the feds would bear an increased cost, so those local taxes will need to be increased. Some place might actually do alright. But the state govt would still grow their education bureaucracy to deal with the increased responsibilities. And since each state will have to do this it is a jobs package as well?[/quote]

No, those administrative jobs are already replicated.

58

[quote]ZEB wrote:

[quote]Ryan P. McCarter wrote:

[quote]ZEB wrote:
I think the republicans in Congress made him do it and I LOVE IT. [/quote]

Then please do not ever complain about the deficit again.

[/quote]

Simple concept, STOP SPENDING. Spending cuts MUST be accompanied with any tax cut. But here is where all politicians especially the democrats lose the fight.

By the way they can begin with Jimmy Carters Department of Education. [/quote]

But UNLESS you stop spending at the same time you cut revenue, you end up with a deficit. If your wife did this shit, you’d be on here complaining about it, but when the republicans do it, you strap on your pom-poms.

Also, have fun explaining to that pitchfork-toting mob how they should all thank you for taking away their food and medical care. There’s a reason a lot of brash guys like you go to Washington every year, talking a big game about shrinking government, and then end up either doing nothing, or adding to the debt.

59

Umm…you do understand that the government and, yes, the Federal Reserve, are the only things keeping the bottom from dropping out of the economy right now, don’t you? Do you think businesses hire based on how big or small the government is? Do you understand that they have to have customers, paying money for goods or services, before they hire? I desire that you explain, exactly, how taking away millions of customers for businesses across the country would cause them to do anything other than lay more people off. The burden of proof really is on you, because everything you say here contradicts econ 101.

The stimulus money, actually, saved about 3 million jobs. This has been confirmed by the CBO, as well as multiple independent analysts, including Goldman Sachs:

“For the third quarter, economists at Goldman Sachs & Co. predict the U.S. economy will grow by 3.3%. “Without that extra stimulus, we would be somewhere around zero,” said Jan Hatzius, chief U.S. economist for Goldman.”

IT helped in several ways: through expanded food stamps and payments to unemployed, as well as tax credits to workers, and aid to states so they could keep public employees like teachers on the payrolls, it put a lot of money directly into the economy. It’s fairly easy to understand. A lot of it, however was tax cuts, which economists warned would be ineffective. Lo and behold.

60

[quote]Tex Ag wrote:
One of the real issues with govt spending is how a budget works. Quite simply, an office losses its funding if it does not spend all of its money. It is not allowed to save for future expenditures that do not occur every year, like upgrading technology. So, there is a rush to spend everything to try and keep funding and some extra money if the need arises.

There are thousands (if not hundred of thousands) of govt offices (universities work this way as well) that are spending money needlessly at the end of the year to meet the demand of the budget. So basically, I am saying the fundamental way we account for govt spending leads to bloated expenditures. We can argue where to cut spending, but honestly, the real savings would be in developing a system that rewards, rather than punishes, cost savings.

Sorry if not sexy.[/quote]

Yup, totally agree! I’ve been thinking about that for years now. Problem is, I think that is even more of a long term solution than the cut spending thing is. You can cut spending immediately (if you actually wanted to, har har). But restructuring the way the budget is rewarded/punished is a sort of long-term endeavor with internal regulatory changes and other things.