I Cried Today

Dan wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Bearcat89 wrote:</div>
This is it 100 percent. You can see it clearly just on this site alone.

Agree. People talk about the handouts, welfare, free stuff, then have the back of corporations or others who get tax breaks or bailouts, or vice versa. No one is going to want to pay taxes but all of us in the middle class do, we work hard and then get a bunch of money taken from us. So what should matter is when people or groups unethically find ways to take advantage of that, get free stuff, or not pay taxes.

Agree on limits like Glenn says. Anyone at any time could need assistance out of the blue. When that goes on too long or is abused that becomes a problem. Conversely, I don’t think success should be punished, and rich people aren’t obligated to solve the problems. However, when my tax dollars go to bailout money to prop a company up, then that money is used to pay out bonuses, there’s a problem. When wealthy people or businesses get granted money through programs such as PPP and they don’t need it, there’s a problem.

100% agree, and why I am so adamant about not giving the Govt any more money. If you’re lucky they will waste it, more likely it will be used to payoff a Corporation or Executive’s debt, bailout a business that should have failed or start another war.

Rinella had a great point that I try to remind myself of regularly, we constantly hear and see how divisive or polarized we are in today’s society. Which sure seems true online, and I’m definitely guilty of encouraging it at times as well. However, he said he travels across the country regularly from Deep Blue big cities to fully Red rural areas, and never sees it in person. You never (or very rarely) see people having heated debates in person, or all the divisiveness or polarization in person. Which I also agree is my experience as well. So I guess my point is 1. thanks for keeping most debates on here fairly respectable, even if we disagree. And 2. Keep getting out in the real world, and bring others with you, it’s good for all of us in so many ways, and good for society as a whole.

CaptainMusky wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Gitchi Gummi wrote:</div>
As long as they keep a roughly 50/50 red vs blue mentality in this country, they’ll be able to keep playing us for the fools that we are.

Well Walz just made sure the Dems will be controlling everything in this state by passing the drivers license for all bill yesterday. Now anyone living here legally or not will be allowed to vote. How great.

Under the law, licenses can be used for driving and identification purposes but not to vote or to obtain a REAL ID. But why pay attention to the facts?

Also the existing law that prevents them from getting drivers licenses was only just enacted during the Pawlenty administration. (That was a unilateral move, what a dictator that guy was!) Yet somehow prior to that law, when immigrants could get licenses, democrats weren’t “controlling everything” as you’re predicting. Funny.

BigWerm wrote:

Rinella had a great point that I try to remind myself of regularly, we constantly hear and see how divisive or polarized we are in today’s society. Which sure seems true online, and I’m definitely guilty of encouraging it at times as well. However, he said he travels across the country regularly from Deep Blue big cities to fully Red rural areas, and never sees it in person. You never (or very rarely) see people having heated debates in person, or all the divisiveness or polarization in person. Which I also agree is my experience as well. So I guess my point is 1. thanks for keeping most debates on here fairly respectable, even if we disagree. And 2. Keep getting out in the real world, and bring others with you, it’s good for all of us in so many ways, and good for society as a whole.

Have been reading through this thread and was just thinking about this point this morning too. we all have a lot more in common than not. I dont travel as much as i used to but ive been all over both cities and the middle of nowhere and i have never ever had a verbal argument about politics with anyone. Its just this damn internet that has us at each others throats. Get in person and people usual find a way to agree on some things

crappie55369 wrote:

Have been reading through this thread and was just thinking about this point this morning too. we all have a lot more in common than not. I dont travel as much as i used to but ive been all over both cities and the middle of nowhere and i have never ever had a verbal argument about politics with anyone. Its just this damn internet that has us at each others throats. Get in person and people usual find a way to agree on some things

This is very true. The opposing sides have more in common than they dont its just traditionally deeply rooted beliefs learned from their parents. I have changed dramatically over the years from where I was when I was younger. My parents and I do not align with each other at all. They would sit and watch regular news on all the local channels multiple times a day and just soak it all in never questioning anything they were seeing or being fed. There are a lot of people just like them. I cannot watch the news anymore its too infuriating.

Dirtywater nailed it!
MISINFORMATION is what is killing this Country and making all or us argue. Referring to the comment that people dont have these debates in person but will be a keyboard warrior and spread misinformation.
Biggest misinformation piece that is still being spread around social media is 87,000 IRS agents and the related crap they are going after paypal and venmo type services. Totally blown out of proportion!
If you dont see Russia, China and others manipulating us against each other you have your head in the sand.

I have to say I’m impressed. This is one of the most civil and constructive politically charged conversations I’ve ever seen on the IDO forums. Well done fellas

Gitchi Gummi wrote:

I have to say I’m impressed. This is one of the most civil and constructive politically charged conversations I’ve ever seen on the IDO forums. Well done fellas

Agree this has stayed relatively calm

Well when you have a bunch of grown men crying…..

Ugh, why does every reply I post just not get posted?

BigWerm, You misread or misunderstand my point. I am NOT saying that income is the same as wealth growth. At all. The ultra-wealthy are:
1. Paying less taxes as a percent of their income than you or me.
2. Are also not paying taxes on the exorbitant wealth growth they have seen(especially over the last 10-20 years). (this is a different can of worms as you rightfully mentioned)

The reality is it doesn’t matter which way you look at it, the ultra-wealthy are still paying less in taxes as a percent of their income than we are.

Bezos: 23%
Gates: 18%
Bloomberg: 4%
Zuckerberg: 14%
Koch: 17%

That’s tax burden as a percent of REPORTED INCOME. And that’s if you trust that those folks are all claiming ALL of their income appropriately come tax time, do you believe they are? When you consider the other regressive taxes I talked about, the overall tax burdens go down significantly.

At the corporate level it’s even worse. Trump cut the corporate tax rate significantly while in office, it went from a max of 35% down to 21%. And that’s before all the clever accounting they do come tax time. Amazon’s effective tax rate on their income is like 5% over the last 4 years. They’ve avoided paying tens of billions in taxes over that time, just like hundreds of other fortune 500 companies.

I just really don’t get the corporate love amongst the conservative crew. Companies like Amazon are NOT sunshine and rainbows for our economy and society. The Amazons and Wal-Marts have put thousands of small companies out of business, they don’t pay a living wage to a majority of their employees, the working conditions they offer are terrible, they aggressively stomp out any form of unionization or labor movements, as well as competition at every turn. Conservatives love to talk about saving small town America and all that jazz, but then defend Amazon and Wal-mart when they come in and push out small businesses across the country, receive a ridiculous amount of local and federal tax susbsidies, and avoid paying taxes at alarming rates on a yearly basis.

Going back to Captain Musky’s initial argument, you SHOULD be pissed when you see crumbling roads and infrastructure, and you should be really pissed that a company like Amazon who rolls out trillions of pounds of vehicle and wear and tear on a daily basis is paying significantly less(proportionally) than you are to help maintain that infrastructure. They are utilizing those resources exponentially more than you are, and are NOT paying their fair share.

Lastly, again, I agree that spending is a problem too. That’s like not part of my argument at all and a separate problem altogether. But yeah, if large parts of the Department of Defense budget is being poorly managed, isn’t that kind of like what I’m saying? Stop giving the DoD so much money. Military budget makes up a part of the DoD total budget, so reduce them both, they are both out of whack.

My point is why do people think it’s okay for people with billions of dollars, millions of reported income, more millions of unreported income, to pay a smaller percent of their income towards taxes than you are? Why protect them?

In 1989, CEOs made 35 times more than a typical worker.
In 2022, CEOs make 399 times more than a typical worker.

That seem right to you?

Hard Water Fan wrote:

Justin pretty much lost any credibility he had with that statement.

I am a conservative. I voted against Trump in 16, for him in 20. Will not support him moving forward.

Our government taxes the blank out of hard working people, whether or not they are “wealthy”, and then is not a good steward of what they take. There is waste from top to bottom in our government. Yet taxpayers are the ones that pay that price.

Alright LOL let’s be real, you supported Trump for 4+ years but what I said made me lose credibility? That’s how Trump communicated on a daily basis as the leader of the free world for 4 years.

Mr. “Grab ’em by the *****?”
Mr. *Makes fun of disabled reporter*

Seriously, those didn’t register on your moral compass but me saying that far right conservatives are physically incapable of acknowledging the shortcomings of their elected politicians is like, “whoa we can’t listen to this guy anymore”.

Justin, this is my take on it and no I do not want to protect the ultra rich companies. Where the conservative view comes on business as I always understood it is that if the company I work for has more money, then I stand a much better chance in my wages going up. The whole democrat view of splitting the pie up and we can all have some idea is nice until there is no more money to split up, then what. We are always going to have the rich and the poor, it is the way our country is set up. Anyone of us can start a business and hope to have it prosper. But the way you sound like you want it, if it does to well in your opinion they need to give some of it to you. That I do not understand. I am all for the ultra’s like you mentioned paying a larger share. But where do we draw that line?

Justin Donson wrote:

1. Paying less taxes as a percent of their income than you or me.
2. Are also not paying taxes on the exorbitant wealth growth they have seen(especially over the last 10-20 years). (this is a different can of worms as you rightfully mentioned)
The reality is it doesn’t matter which way you look at it, the ultra-wealthy are still paying less in taxes as a percent of their income than we are.

Bezos: 23%
Gates: 18%
Bloomberg: 4%
Zuckerberg: 14%
Koch: 17%

Where are you getting this info? I’ve done a fair amount of research and everything talks the uber wealthy tax rate in relation to their net worth, not income. No one is arguing for Bezos or Musk or anyone to not pay their fair share, or even more than their fair share. What I am saying is 1. the govt is not a good steward of our money in any way shape or form. And 2. whatever additional taxes are added to the wealthiest will end up being written in a way that allows the wealthy to (continue to) avoid them, and likely end up with a larger burden on the middle class, same as it is currently. The same tax code you want to change has been designed this way for a reason, and will continue to be designed with loopholes that benefit the wealthy regardless of what we may want. FWIW here’s the cleanest breakdown with bipartisan sources, that I’ve found on effective tax rates:
http://www.heritage.org/taxes/commentary/1-chart-how-much-the-rich-pay-taxes

John Rasmussen wrote:

Justin, this is my take on it and no I do not want to protect the ultra rich companies. Where the conservative view comes on business as I always understood it is that if the company I work for has more money, then I stand a much better chance in my wages going up. The whole democrat view of splitting the pie up and we can all have some idea is nice until there is no more money to split up, then what. We are always going to have the rich and the poor, it is the way our country is set up. Anyone of us can start a business and hope to have it prosper. But the way you sound like you want it, if it does to well in your opinion they need to give some of it to you. That I do not understand. I am all for the ultra’s like you mentioned paying a larger share. But where do we draw that line?

I understand what you’re saying, but I have less trust in corporations or the ultra wealthy than I do the government, and that’s saying something! I don’t think people realize the type of people billionaires are. To accumulate that much wealth requires so much greed…no one here will ever be a billionaire, most likely because everyone here is too good of a person.

You’re kind of just getting to the whole trickle down economics thing here though. It’s been proven that wealth does not ‘trickle down’, it just gets more consolidated with a fewer number of people. Earnings and wealth gap continues to widen every year. How many companies were given government funding over the pandemic, and how many of them actually put that money in the pocket of their employees versus executive bonuses, stock buy-backs, etc.

The bolded part is absolutely NOT what I am saying. That’s just the right wing media mouthpiece coming through again. I don’t want them to give ME money, I want them to pay their fair share, which they aren’t. I have no problem paying what I pay, and I’d have no problem paying more, if it meant that the bottom 80 or 90% of Americans had a better quality of life.

I am not asking for more money from the government, I’m not asking for corporations to somehow just give me money. I do however wish that corporate profits were dispersed more fairly to the laborers who truly earn them? YES, but that’s not really me, that’s the true laborers in this country. Again, with every year that passes, the ultra-wealthy are scooping up a greater piece of the wealth and income pie. That disparity is too high and needs to be reduced. Again, look at the pay gap between CEOs and typical workers and how much that has changed in the last few decades as the balance of power has shifted to the utlra wealthy. Any of you work in corporate America? Have you ever met an executive that you felt was 100, 200, 300, 400x more valuable to the company than you were?

CEOs shouldn’t make 400 times an average worker, companies shouldn’t be allowed to use government bail outs for stock buy-backs instead of investing into their employees and their company, large companies should be shouldering more of a burden to fix and enhance the infrastructure that they are taking advantage of to make record profits.

The far right media will twist this and make it sound like that puts you in crosshairs if you’re going to start a company tomorrow. This isn’t about any business that anybody here owns or will start. James Holst just sold his company for probably 7 or 8 figures and HE is not who I’m talking about.

This is talking about fortune 500/100/50 type companies. The mega corporations that have unlimited resources and lobbying power. Some of these companies probably spend more money lobbying than they do paying taxes.

Justin Donson wrote:

I have less trust in corporations or the ultra wealthy than I do the government

I’m always amazed at how many people, including many on this site, that have zero trust in big government but will defend big business to the death.

Justin Donson wrote:

The ultra-wealthy are:
1. Paying less taxes as a percent of their income than you or me.

So are the lower income Group. So it sounds like you are Saying its wrong that Wealthy people are paying a Smaller share of their income than you. But you are fine that the lower income group also is? When I look at the overall amount of taxes broke down by various income groups, I have more of a problem with the little or none paid by the lower income groups. After all they are also the people that are most often benefiting from tax money. It gets really old hearing people say the rich don’t pay their fair share. Just so we are clear, I’m not rich, far from it. I’m probably in the lower middle income group. To me this is the group that always seems to get hammered the most when it comes to Taxes. Check out the stat’s here :
https://taxfoundation.org/publications/latest-federal-income-tax-data/#:~:text=High%2DIncome%20Taxpayers%20Paid%20the%20Majority%20of%20Federal%20Income%20Taxes,of%20all%20federal%20income%20taxes.

Dan wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Justin Donson wrote:</div>
I have less trust in corporations or the ultra wealthy than I do the government

I’m always amazed at how many people, including many on this site, that have zero trust in big government but will defend big business to the death.

Pretty easy, big business has solved millions of problems, encourages cooperation across borders and all demographics and the worst atrocities have been relatively (relative to say a nuclear explosion) minor environmental damages and damage to main street businesses all while you have the freedom to choose to support them or not. Amazon sure is popular and has made a lot of lives easier, in spite of it being supposedly as evil as Justin says. Meanwhile Govt has murdered endless millions of it’s own and other countries citizens, gives you no choice whether to support them financially or not, and hasn’t solved any modern worldly problems (that I’m aware of).

fishthumper wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Justin Donson wrote:</div>
The ultra-wealthy are:
1. Paying less taxes as a percent of their income than you or me.

Absolutley not true.

and I agree with Bigwerm,
I will defend big biz because they made it. They worked hard and made it.
The Government didn’t, they take it from us. They are spending our money not theirs and they spend like drunkin sailors.
A while back when Farmington school district was putting in a new High School.They got into a dispute with the City of Farmington over paving a road out front of my place.
The City of Farmington sued the Farmington school district over this.
So my money was suing my money. Ya, the government really is a good caretaker of my money.

Eelpoutguy wrote:

The City of Farmington sued the Farmington school district over this.
So my money was suing my money. Ya, the government really is a good caretaker of my money.

That’s some next level stupidity there.

BigWerm wrote:

Pretty easy, big business has solved millions of problems, encourages cooperation across borders and all demographics and the worst atrocities have been relatively (relative to say a nuclear explosion) minor environmental damages and damage to main street businesses all while you have the freedom to choose to support them or not. Amazon sure is popular and has made a lot of lives easier, in spite of it being supposedly as evil as Justin says. Meanwhile Govt has murdered endless millions of it’s own and other countries citizens, gives you no choice whether to support them financially or not, and hasn’t solved any modern worldly problems (that I’m aware of).

All good points, but that’s pretty cherry-picking for a pro-business, anti-government argument. Trust me, I’m NOT advocating or cheerleading for the government. But with the examples you provide, a lot can be said on the opposing side as well. The government helped stop Nazi Germany, kept our skies free from terrorists since 9/11, develops new things daily, etc. You’re right in all you said about business, and in a free market they’re probably developing things better and faster because money is involved, compared to government work where they’re being paid either way. But businesses can also injure or kill people, unethically or even illegally drive up prices, take advantage of natural disasters or pandemics and use them as cover to raise prices, etc. Their higher-level people continue to make more and more money and it’s just not trickling down like many claim it does.

Again Werm, I know all your points are valid but I feel like there’s plenty of good points on both sides for both business and government. In today’s current events and political climate so many people want you to pick a side, an extreme side at that, with no room for discussion. When it comes to government or business, I just don’t trust either.

fishthumper wrote:

When I look at the overall amount of taxes broke down by various income groups, I have more of a problem with the little or none paid by the lower income groups. After all they are also the people that are most often benefiting from tax money. It gets really old hearing people say the rich don’t pay their fair share.

Just so we are clear, you have more of an issue with someone at the poverty line with negative net worth getting a special tax credit than you do when a billionaire (like POTUS45) doesn’t pay any taxes?

My favorite liberal debate point… but Trump…

Is caught by an undercover recording talking about grabbing pu77ys, which he totally admitted, it was locker room talk he made up… I am sure the holier than thou on here have never uttered such words.

And makes fun of a reporter who “can’t remember” what he wrote in the Times when it backs up Trumps claim… they were both douches on that one.

But Trump….

see again..POTUS45 followed all tax codes, written by Hillary.

Dan wrote:

All good points, but that’s pretty cherry-picking for a pro-business, anti-government argument. Trust me, I’m NOT advocating or cheerleading for the government. But with the examples you provide, a lot can be said on the opposing side as well. The government helped stop Nazi Germany, kept our skies free from terrorists since 9/11, develops new things daily, etc. You’re right in all you said about business, and in a free market they’re probably developing things better and faster because money is involved, compared to government work where they’re being paid either way. But businesses can also injure or kill people, unethically or even illegally drive up prices, take advantage of natural disasters or pandemics and use them as cover to raise prices, etc. Their higher-level people continue to make more and more money and it’s just not trickling down like many claim it does.

Fair points (except the create things daily), but when a business makes a mistake they suffer the consequences, and almost immediately. Unless the Govt protects them from the consequences, like capping Pharma lawsuits or medical malpractice, giving bank bailouts, allowing monopolies or access to the market by competition etc. etc… And all the negative things for business (price gouging, taking advantage of natural disasters etc.) the govt does more, and more effectively! Go look at all the politicians, from both parties, trades leading up to and during the pandemic on UnusualWhales.com. They were making millions and saving millions in losses on the stock exchange, all while locking us rubes down.

Dan wrote:

When it comes to government or business, I just don’t trust either.

In general I don’t either, but with business I can easily vote not to support them (Haven’t shopped at Walmart in a decade+), while the Govt just gives me the illusion of choice (2 party system) and the inability for direct action. If I choose not to financially support the Govt’s proxy war in Ukraine, or bombing innocent people in Yemen, I will go to jail.

JFC I’ve had to re-enter this response like six friggin’ times. Maybe this site is trying to tell me something :).

But to respond to fishthumper’s question, YES, I am okay paying a higher percent of my income to FEDERAL INCOME taxes than the lower class. For a couple reasons.

One, again, Federal income taxes are just ONE part of the taxation puzzle, and media talking points will almost always leave out the regressive pieces of our tax system. Try with an open mind to think hard about this, because it’s important to really think about how much harder some taxes hit our lower class than high earners.

Lower income families/people pay a higher percentage of their income towards social security than I do.

Lower income families/people pay a higher percentage of their income towards excise taxes than I do(think gas/fuel taxes). This is even worse now, I have the luxury of working from home and most of them do not.

Lower income families/people pay a higher percentage of their income towards sin taxes(alcohol, tobacco). If we each smoke a pack a day, they are using a great % of their income than I am towards those taxes.

Lower income families/people pay a higher percentage of their income towards rent/housing than I am. My income share towards my mortgage decreases every year that I get a raise(which is every year). My mortgage is fixed, and in the process I’m building equity/net worth as my loan amount goes down and my property value increases. Meanwhile, they have no property, they are not growing wealth, their rent is going up, or their variable mortgage, and their income is NOT rising at the same rate.

Lower income families/people pay a higher percentage of their income towards their health insurance than I am(I know this is not a tax, just another example).

Second, 30% of Americans have ZERO savings. They have zero or negative net worth. Like how do you expect them to pay MORE than they are today? It’s like trying to juice a carrot with your bare hand, there’s not a lot of juice worth the squeeze.

So for me, I have no problem paying a bigger share than the poorest families in America, I’m in a really fortunate position to earn what I do at my relatively young age. I also know that the income growth pie isn’t fair today. A 5% raise for me is a whole lot more money than a 5% raise for a lot of people, I guarantee I’m not working as hard, and I’m not exacting the same physical toll on my body that many need to.

Gitchi Gummi wrote:

ust so we are clear, you have more of an issue with someone at the poverty line with negative net worth getting a special tax credit than you do when a billionaire (like POTUS45) doesn’t pay any taxes?

First of all you show me where any billionaire, including potus45 did not pay any tax. Look at the data attached on my reply. The rich are paying a TON of tax. while a real large % of people are paying VERY little if any tax at all. If that is your definition of a special tax credit, YES, you are correct in what I said.

Thanks for your persistence Justin.

bigwerm and fishthumper, the Heritage Foundation and the Tax Foundation are not unbiased or “bipartisan” sources. In that heritage piece the author mostly just cites his own work in the daily signal or other heritage junk. Then he pats himself on the back for citing one “liberal” source and in doing so he tries to claim they agree with him that taxes are progressive, when the article actually states the exact opposite.

“…when one considers all the taxes that Americans pay, it turns out that our tax system overall is barely progressive.”

BigWerm wrote:

Fair points (except the create things daily), but when a business makes a mistake they suffer the consequences, and almost immediately. Unless the Govt protects them from the consequences, like capping Pharma lawsuits or medical malpractice, giving bank bailouts, allowing monopolies or access to the market by competition etc. etc… And all the negative things for business (price gouging, taking advantage of natural disasters etc.) the govt does more, and more effectively! Go look at all the politicians, from both parties, trades leading up to and during the pandemic on UnusualWhales.com. They were making millions and saving millions in losses on the stock exchange, all while locking us rubes down.

In general I don’t either, but with business I can easily vote not to support them (Haven’t shopped at Walmart in a decade+), while the Govt just gives me the illusion of choice (2 party system) and the inability for direct action. If I choose not to financially support the Govt’s proxy war in Ukraine, or bombing innocent people in Yemen, I will go to jail.

I think we’re talking about a different set of business here BW. When a mega-business, the massive, consolidated, heavily active lobbyist type company’s make a mistake…they aren’t punished. You just listed like a bunch of the greatest examples of how big business in the US pretty much owns the government and can’t fail.

If your argument is that the government is worse/more evil than corporations, that’d be one thing. But you’re giving off ‘mega corporations good’ ‘government bad’ type vibes, which is what I’m probably disagreeing with most.

If it’s a question of which is worse….both lol. They are both worse. Partly because you can’t separate the two at this point. The amount of money flowing through Washington through corporations, shell companies, PACs etc it’s pretty much impossible to distinguish between corporate America and the government.

And like I said, our politicians are nearly all bought and paid for. There’s a select few that aren’t, but not many. So who’s worse, the politicians that are being paid off and taking advantage of their positions of power or the corporations and ultra wealthy that are buying them off to suit their needs?

You’re right though, it is an illusion of choice. Your vote is meaningless, as is mine. A full blown labor strike is about the only thing that will inspire change or move the needle. But oh wait, union rights and labor right have been stripped down to nothing in the US so that’s never going to happen. Wait, what’s that? Oh yeah, we’re also like the only developed country in the world that ties health care to your job, making it nearly impossible for lower and lower middle class families to organize and hit the streets. And oh yeah, the billionaire owned media circus has effectively been brainwashing the majority of the country to blame each other, or the poor, or minorities, or immigrants, or spend time fighting about friggin’ abortion or drag shows…

So the left fights the right instead of the poor fighting the rich.

dirtywater wrote:

bigwerm and fishthumper, the Heritage Foundation and the Tax Foundation are not unbiased or “bipartisan” sources.

Dirty water – If you don’t like the source I posted, Feel free to post one of yours that shows different data. I’ll be more than happy to look at any data you care to share that shows different Info.

Justin Donson wrote:

But to respond to fishthumper’s question, YES, I am okay paying a higher percent of my income to FEDERAL INCOME taxes than the lower class. For a couple reasons

Justin – I’m not disagreeing with you that higher income groups should not pay a higher % of taxes. I’m just saying its not valid that rich people are not paying their share. I also have to disagree that lower income groups pay more in other taxes than higher income groups do. Lets use property taxes and license tax for examples. Just to name a few. As far as the so called sin taxes go, I don’t feel sorry for anyone on those. That is a choice. I know a ton of high income people who drink far more than some low income people.

fishthumper wrote:

Dirty water – If you don’t like the source I posted, Feel free to post one of yours that shows different data. I’ll be more than happy to look at any data you care to share that shows different Info.

Fun exercise— here’s one that is equally as biased but in the opposite direction. I’m honest enough that admit that up front, this is just an opinion piece, but so is yours. My problem lies in presenting this junk as facts. https://newrepublic.com/article/162709/conservative-media-bezos-buffet-tax-dodgers

According to this piece the “true tax rate” of the ultra rich is 3.4%—- oh and the cherry on the top, it also says trump paid 750 bucks in taxes in 2016, and nothin in 10 of the 15 years. Only including that because someone (maybe you?) requested to see a source that showed 45 didn’t pay his fair share. I’m way past harping on 45, just responding to that comment above.

fishthumper wrote:

First of all you show me where any billionaire, including potus45 did not pay any tax. Look at the data attached on my reply. The rich are paying a TON of tax. while a real large % of people are paying VERY little if any tax at all. If that is your definition of a special tax credit, YES, you are correct in what I said.

POTUS45’s tax returns are out there for you to see. Do you think I’m making it up? Google his tax returns if you don’t believe me.

On his 2020 tax return, he paid zero federal taxes and got a refund of over $5 MILLION. In 2016 and 2017, he paid $1,500 total and then paid no taxes the previous 10 years. If that doesn’t bother you, I don’t know what would. Go back to burying your head in the sand and worrying about the person in poverty with negative net worth who is getting a tax credit you aren’t.