Polls are cited by the right when they support a conservative position, otherwise they are attacked as biased or, more often, just disregarded and treated as a non-event. (The left does it too but far less often.) Usually the criticism is based on a misunderstanding of survey methods. "Sampling" is about as scientific as social science is going to get, although of course anybody can screw up once in a while. You can be disappointed by the results (as I am sometimes) but you can't cry that the sample was too small or the organization was biased. CBS did DO this poll. They hired a professional organization to do it. And, can I make a suggestion? Before slinging around dirty names like "communist" and "socialist," do a little reading so you know what the words mean.
The rich won't be paying whether the tax breaks expire or not. This tax break had little real effect on the billionaires and centimillionaires. The taxable income they make is largely from capital gains which have a maximum tax rate of 15% with the tax breaks but just 20% without it. Even a 15% rate is apparently too much for the super rich to be paying as they put large amounts of income into their endowments (aka charities like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) and pay a 0% tax rate on that while being required to spend just 5% a year of that endowment's worth. This amounts to a de facto 5% tax rate! The national media not only does an exceptionally poor job of reporting how little the nation's richest citizens pay in taxes but lauds them for giving to "charity."
Last year, Warren Buffet wrote that he paid about 16% taxes on over $50 million income for the year and that his overall tax rate was lower than his secretary's rate! In 2003, Senator Kerry's wife Teresa Heinz Kerry paid $12.9% on 51 million in income. If you included his charity donations as income, Bill Gates would have paid less than a 10% tax rate on over $30 billion in income declared over the last 10 years. That's a lower tax rate than a person earning minimum wage if one includes social security payments.
I don't have any web links to verify what I've written and a lot of that is because like I said earlier, the media hasn't been reporting this story. Occasionally, the major networks have disingenuously begun a story about the tax break controversy by reporting how the nation's wealthiest have prospered so much more over the last 25 years than the middle class but they never tell the viewer how little the tax breaks affect the super rich. It's even implied in some of the broadcasts that the billionaires will be paying tax rates of 39.4% if the tax breaks expire. I can't believe the correspondents and segment producers are that uninformed.
The rich haven't done anything except be rich. They're not evil. But they do owe more than the working class to the society that made their wealth possible. And, facing facts, what exactly have people like the Kennedy kids, Paris Hilton, Tori Spelling, and Kim Kardashian done that renders their income into "hard-earned tax dollars"? Lots of people seem to be blaming the Republicans for rejecting a modest (5%) tax increase on any income OVER a quarter of a million -- or over a MILLION, according to Schumer's plan. That's an awful lot of dough. But the Republicans probably aren't stopping Obama's plan because they're funded by millionaires. Some Dems are funded by the wealthy too. They're stopping it for political reasons. I can't imagine why this isn't clear to everyone because it's certainly been stated openly. Rush Limbaugh: "I want Obama to fail." McConnell: "The goal is to make Obama a one-term president." DeMint: "This could break him. This could be his Waterloo." How often must the GOP TELL US what their goal is? It's not the welfare of the republic.
The IRS reports that in 2007 (the last year we have data for), the richest 400 people in the country paid 16.6 percent in federal income taxes. During one of his years as governor of California, Regan paid zero in state taxes. But none of that matters to Obama's diamond-hard enemies. The national debt doesn't matter; the deficit is of no consequence; Paris Hilton's hard-earned tax dollars mean nothing. They are voting their morality, not their reason. They hate Democrats and Obama, and they are Social Darwinists. Obama is evil not because he's a socialist (a word nobody could define without looking it up) but because he's Obama. Paraphrasing Thomas Hobbes, "We don't dislike something because it's bad; we call it bad because we dislike it."
Not to worry, the rich will get their way. Our "God help me if I go down in history as the uppity you-know-what president" will cave in and be known as the "Yes massah, no massah" president, subservient to his Republican massah.
All of the poor republicans can revel in thier success in allowing thier part in control. Intially you believed there was hope . Oh how quickly you have been and will be abandoned. Iam neither democrat or republican. Iam a member of the Cherokee Nation. I see all the damage that both parties do their supporters but the republicans will lose more supporters over the next two years than ever before because they have abandoned the very people who put them in control.Poor is poor get used to it you did it to your self.
Since the dems took over the house in 2006 they have added $5 trillion ( that 5,000 billion dollars folks) to the national debt. If they had concentrated on fiscal responsibilty (Pelosi said "pay as we go)instead of their marxist spending spree it's likely we wouldn't be having this debate in the first place. Yeah, Bush did it too but this bunch is Bush X 10.
Bush took a 20 million dollar budget surplus (that could have been used to pay down the national debt) and turned it into a 900 billion budget deficit + a 3 trillion dollar national debt with those tax cuts of his. Then he bailed out all his banker friends when they went bankrupt. If the Democrats hadn't raised spending one bit we still would have been having this discussion - plus the US would have a sole monopoly auto industry and the unemployment rate would be double what it is today.
Last I checked, most of the broader economy is underpinned by the work and consumer demand of the middle classes, even though they tend to have significantly less after-tax discretionary income. And businesses employ people when there's demand, not just because their tax rates might be a few percent lower. The reason nearly 50% of Americans didn't have a FEDERAL liability for 2009 was either because they didn't earn enough, or they qualified for enough deductions to cancel it (some of the same deductions that the wealthy are very adept at taking advantage of).
As for the poll, I thought Boehner et al. claim to have their fingers on the pulse of the American public. Perhaps the election results had more to do with frustrated Americans taking a stab at an alternative, or not even voting, than a ringing endorsement of a set of policy specifics.
The Republicans have to pay back their buds that got them elected, thats what the Bush tax cuts are all about and GUESS WHAT--thats what they are still about.
If American politicians keep beating up the successful and wealthy of our land the poor will soon starve. Did anyone ever get a paying job from a poor person? Every tax on business is immediately passed to the consumer; so don't buy the lie, the tax on the wealthy is a tax you and I pay.
Bucyrus, I don't think my self-employment income should be tax-free. You do? Businesses could also get hiring incentives, and if they're profitable enough to be taxed at the higher rate I doubt holding back on pre-tax hiring expenses would make sense in most cases.
The only thing that has ever created jobs is demand. The rich don't invest to create jobs. You have to have demand and buying power from the lower and middle class. Only then will the rich invest in more jobs. The tax cuts for the rich are so Republicans in Congress can get donations from the rich--nice little cycle they have going.
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The rich won't be paying whether the tax breaks expire or not. This tax break had little real effect on the billionaires and centimillionaires. The taxable income they make is largely from capital gains which have a maximum tax rate of 15% with the tax breaks but just 20% without it. Even a 15% rate is apparently too much for the super rich to be paying as they put large amounts of income into their endowments (aka charities like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) and pay a 0% tax rate on that while being required to spend just 5% a year of that endowment's worth. This amounts to a de facto 5% tax rate! The national media not only does an exceptionally poor job of reporting how little the nation's richest citizens pay in taxes but lauds them for giving to "charity."
Last year, Warren Buffet wrote that he paid about 16% taxes on over $50 million income for the year and that his overall tax rate was lower than his secretary's rate! In 2003, Senator Kerry's wife Teresa Heinz Kerry paid $12.9% on 51 million in income. If you included his charity donations as income, Bill Gates would have paid less than a 10% tax rate on over $30 billion in income declared over the last 10 years. That's a lower tax rate than a person earning minimum wage if one includes social security payments.
I don't have any web links to verify what I've written and a lot of that is because like I said earlier, the media hasn't been reporting this story. Occasionally, the major networks have disingenuously begun a story about the tax break controversy by reporting how the nation's wealthiest have prospered so much more over the last 25 years than the middle class but they never tell the viewer how little the tax breaks affect the super rich. It's even implied in some of the broadcasts that the billionaires will be paying tax rates of 39.4% if the tax breaks expire. I can't believe the correspondents and segment producers are that uninformed.
As for the poll, I thought Boehner et al. claim to have their fingers on the pulse of the American public. Perhaps the election results had more to do with frustrated Americans taking a stab at an alternative, or not even voting, than a ringing endorsement of a set of policy specifics.