Re: Ok Trekkers, Don't Forget To Sign Up For Mandatory Obamacare Oct 1
It is different from the free ride half the country gets now.
You've mentioned the Romney 47%/"half the country are freeloaders" cliché at least twice that I've seen in this thread.
- First off, it's astonishing to me that anyone is still quoting a widely reviled comment from a failed candidate who even Republicans won't touch with a ten foot pole these days.
- Secondly, it's a bullshit myth that has been thoroughly debunked by countless liberal, neutral, and even fiscal conservative sources since it came out last year, so it takes a very special brand of ignorance to continue quoting it like it's gospel.
- Thirdly, believing and quoting it requires a profound misunderstanding of how taxes work in this country.
- And finally, it's a myth that it's only Democrats benefiting from this, and thus it's progressives who are perpetuating these policies to support their constituents. These tax policies and cuts were implemented and expanded under noted socialists Ford, Reagan, GHW Bush, and GW Bush in addition to Democratic presidents. Many of the people who pay no federal income tax are elderly retired people who have already paid for decades and military personnel serving in combat, so go ahead and call them freeloaders. Also, they're both groups who vote Republican in high numbers.
Educate yourself:
Five myths about the 47 percent
By William G. Gale and Donald B. Marron - September 21, 2012
1. Forty-seven percent of Americans don’t pay taxes.
The most pernicious misconception about people who don’t pay federal income taxes is that they don’t pay any taxes. That oft-heard claim ignores all the other taxes Americans encounter in their daily lives. Almost two-thirds of the 47 percent work, for example, and their payroll taxes help finance Social Security and Medicare. Accounting for this, the share of households paying no net federal taxes falls to 28 percent.
And those aren’t the only other taxes they bear. According to economic research, the corporate income tax discourages domestic investment; that depresses wages, so workers are effectively paying some of the corporate tax. More directly, many households pay federal taxes on gasoline, beer and cigarettes. And then there are state and local sales, property and income taxes — all of which are often less progressive than the federal income tax. Putting all these together, a family of three with an income of $30,000 would owe no federal income tax (in fact, they would get money back). But they could easily pay more than $4,500, or 15 percent of their income, in taxes.
2. Members of the 47 percent will never pay federal income taxes.
Politicians and commentators often talk about those who don’t pay income taxes as though they’re in a special club with lifetime membership. In fact, it’s a highly diverse group, some of whom move in and out from year to year.
When they first join the workforce, for example, young people may not earn enough to pay federal income taxes. The same is true for many of the temporarily unemployed, working parents and entrepreneurs whose businesses experience a loss. But most of these people look forward to the day, perhaps in just a year or two, when their incomes will rise and they will join or rejoin the 53 percent of Americans who do pay federal income taxes.
The reverse is true for many senior citizens: They may pay no federal income tax in retirement, but most did during their working years.
...
The vast majority of people who pay no federal income tax have low earnings, are elderly or have children at home. They are exempt from the income tax because of features Congress added to the tax code, thanks to bipartisan efforts, to help these groups. For example, Presidents Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton both favored the earned-income tax credit (EITC), which has helped millions of families stave off poverty.
About half of these households don’t pay federal income tax simply because their incomes are low. More than one-fifth are retirees who benefit from tax breaks for seniors, including an exemption for most Social Security benefits. And another one-seventh are working families with children whose income tax liability is eliminated because of the child tax credit, the EITC, or the child and dependent care credit. Together, these three groups of taxpayers account for almost 90 percent of the households that pay no federal income tax.
5. Tax increases are the only way to bring more of these households onto the tax rolls.
...
The expansion of the child credit under President George W. Bush in 2001, for example, removed many households from the rolls. Allowing that expansion to expire at year’s end — one factor that could lead to falling off the “fiscal cliff” — would add many back. But few observers and almost no politicians endorse that idea or other changes, such as subjecting more Social Security benefits to taxation, that would have similar effects.
But there is another way. The share of households paying no income tax is near record highs not only because of tax policy but also because of the struggling economy. Higher earnings, particularly for low- and moderate-income workers, would move more Americans into the income-tax-paying category. Indeed, projections show that the share of households paying no federal income tax will decline by more than one-fifth in the coming decade because of economic growth and inflation.
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/...497776_1_income-taxes-federal-income-tax-code
Debunking The Myth That 47% Of Americans Are Freeloaders
September 18, 2012 - By Yashwanth Manjunath
Yes, it is true that 47 percent of Americans do not pay federal income tax. But as Paul Krugman has already pointed out:
…the great bulk of those who pay no income tax pay other taxes; also, many of the people in the no-income-tax category are (a) elderly (b) students or (c) having a bad year, having lost a job — that is, they’re people who have paid income taxes in the past and/or will pay income taxes in the future.
One group Krugman neglected to mention are troops serving in combat, they also pay no federal income tax.
But what about the freeloaders who really are just flat out not earning enough money to have an income tax burden? Those lucky individuals who make less than $10,000 a year? They still have to pay the federal payroll tax, which amounts to 6.2% of income for everyone making up to $110,100 a year, at which point it is capped. So while the person making less than $10,000 a year is paying 6.2% of their income in federal payroll tax, a person making $22 million, like Romney did in 2010, would pay roughly 0.03% of their income. But that’s not all.
When you look at the state and local levels, factoring in income, sales, excise, and property taxes, on average the poorest 20 percent of earners pay 11 percent of their income in total state and local taxes, and the second poorest 20 percent of earners pay 10 percent of their income in state and local taxes. Meanwhile, the richest 1 percent pay only 5 percent of their income in total state and local taxes. In states like Washington and Florida the tax structures are even more regressive with the poor paying 17.3% and 13.5% of their incomes in taxes respectively, while the richest 1 percent pay 2.9% and 2.6%. When ALL federal, state, and local taxes are taken into account, the bottom fifth of households pays about 16 percent of their income in taxes on average, while the second fifth pays about 21 percent.
http://www.alan.com/2012/09/18/debunking-the-myth-that-47-of-americans-are-freeloaders/
The vast majority of non-income taxpayers fall into three categories:
- 17 percent includes students, people with disabilities or illnesses, the long-term unemployed, and other people with very low taxable incomes. Also included would be people like our soldiers in foreign wars who are exempted from paying income taxes while they are on active duty in a war zone.
- 22 percent of people who did not pay federal income taxes in 2009 are people aged 65 or older who have modest incomes (and do not have earnings).
- 61 percent are working people who pay payroll taxes but are not paying income taxes.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/rickung...t-these-people-paying-federal-income-taxes/2/
The truth is that the talking point that half of all Americans pay no taxes is a misrepresentation. Here is the full quote from the Tax Policy Center:
The fraction of tax units paying no income tax varies widely by filing status and type of unit. About 47 percent of single filers will owe no tax, compared with 38 percent of joint filers and 72 percent of heads of household. More than half of elderly tax units and tax units with children will pay no income tax this year.
According to the Center On Budget and Policy Priorities the real reason why 47%-51% of Americans paid no federal income taxes in 2009 is:
The 51 percent figure is an anomaly that reflects the unique circumstances of 2009, when the recession greatly swelled the number of Americans with low incomes and when temporary tax cuts created by the 2009 Recovery Act — including the “Making Work Pay” tax credit and an exclusion from tax of the first $2,400 in unemployment benefits — were in effect. Together, these developments removed millions of Americans from the federal income tax rolls. Both of these temporary tax measures have since expired.
http://archives.politicususa.com/2011/07/18/half-americans-taxes.html
In visual form for the reading impaired (click to enlarge):
Sources:
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxtopics/federal-taxes-households.cfm
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=3505 (You should really read this link too)
So, pretty please with a cherry on top, shut up about half the country being freeloaders, because that's an insulting load of shit. Also, I'd bet many of those "freeloaders" have contributed a great deal more in taxes than you have.
