The Time For That Is Over...
"The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits."
Albert Einstein
Stupidity Apparently Does Not Have A Limit...
Its that time of year again when we decide whether we will approve enough funding for the U.S. to pay the obligations it has already made. We have to decide whether the super rich in this country would suffer more than the middle and lower classes if we had them pay more taxes and the middle and lower classes continue to pay what they already do. Today, Rush Limbaugh is telling all Republicans in the Congress and Senate to refuse to raise taxes on the super rich. So I had to ask myself the question, how much does someone who makes $1,000,000.00 a year suffer by paying $50,000.00 more per year in taxes? If their total tax liability is 30% they will pay $300,000.00 in total taxes. This will leave them $700,000.00, after tax, disposable income. But, what is more likely is that they will pay about 20% total in taxes. Mitt Romney made a total of $42.5 million combined for 2010 and 2011. He paid $6.2 million in taxes for the two years. That comes out to a tax rate of 14.6%. If you add another 5% to that figure he still would only pay at a rate of 19.6%.
The example above with the $1,000,000.00 per year income, paying at a 20% rate would then pay $200,000.00 and have $800,000.00 in disposable income. If someone making $60,000.00 each year pays at a 20% rate, they end up with $48,000.00 in disposable income. Over 90% of all purchases in the U.S. are made by middle class citizens. They furnish over 90% of all the business revenues in the country. The more disposable income the middle class has the more they spend and save, but whether Mitt Romney pays a 15% tax rate or a 20% tax rate will likely make no difference in how much he spends.
When I hear all the clamor from people like Rush Limbaugh, it seems as though the super rich think they are super rich because they are special in some way, but the truth of the matter is that all their loyal customers and their trusted employees are the ones who are responsible for their wealth. There are a hand full of families in this country who have passed the wealth they made in business on to their heirs, but for the most part, the Exxon Mobil, Chase Bank, Kaiser Permanente and tech companies' Board of Directors make such huge salaries because all of us who are in the middle income ranges buy their products and services. If they did not have their middle income employees to furnish their products and services, they would have nothing to sell.
What it meant, in my opinion, when Obama was reelected was that the middle and lower income citizenry in this country are done with having the super wealthy control everything. They all make much, much more than they will ever be able to reasonably use, so the time for greed is over. The time to consider what is best for our country is what is at hand. What I see here is that this means everyone pays a reasonable tax rate, including corporations. It means we cooperate with each other to design a more useful plan for our country going forward. The posturing that our so-called elected officials practice instead of the wise and moderate approach to our country's future, needs to stop. The Time For That Is Over!
Lela