Middle class screw job, MAGA = Winning? Taxes plan

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   ptosisposted 7 years ago

   Tell Congress: Tax reform should help working families, not millionaires!
   https://petitions.signforgood.com/prote … orgood.com
   
       Want a new house? If you're in a big city or a blue state, you'd be screwed. It limits the mortgage tax deduction of $500,000 for new home purchases. Existing mortgages will be grandfathered.
   
       Have a student loan? Bad news. It repeals the deduction for student-loan interest.
   
       Have high medical costs? You're hit, too. It repeals the itemized deduction for medical expenses.
   
       Have children? The child tax credit would be increased from $1,000 to $1,600, though the $4,050 per child exemption would be repealed. In return, it creates a new $300 credit for each person in a filer’s family who isn’t a child. But that tax credit expires in six years.
   
       Do you want to adopt a child? You won't get a tax break. It repeals the tax credit for that, because family values.
   
       Pay a lot in local taxes? Bad news here, too. It repeals the deduction for state and local income and sales taxes. You would still get a deduction for property taxes, up to $10,000.
   
   Meawhile:
   
       Almost all of the cuts go to corporations, in that corporate tax rate cut from 35 percent to 20 percent. But they also gain in income earned abroad which will either be not taxed at all, or taxed at a much lower rate than 20 percent. This, of course, trickles down the wealthy and very wealthy who earn a disproportionate share of their income from capital like stock sales and dividends. Note that none of the breaks that corporations are getting will ever expire.
       The just wealthy and not ultra wealthy—people making in the mid- to high-six figures—move down a bracket to a lower rate.
       The alternative minimum tax, or the AMT, is repealed. The AMT has been around for four decades, and was created to make sure that really wealthy people couldn't take advantage of credits and deductions to reduce their tax bills to almost nothing. The AMT accounts for $31 million of Trump's 2005 $38 million tax bill. (We only know about his 2005 taxes—he hasn't released any other returns.)
       The estate tax is phased out—reduced by increasing the exemption and applying it to a smaller set of the very wealthy—then repealed entirely in six years.
   
   
   
   Republicans made it abundantly clear what their top priority is once again: padding the bank accounts of their wealthy pals, even if it means ripping off America's hardworking families, seniors, and the poor.
   
   Rather than writing a tax reform plan in the open – one that puts economic growth and Americans' financial security first – the Republican tax proposal targets America's working families, seniors and the poor. And it's all to further line the pockets of the wealthiest few and big corporations: the exact folks who need the least help.
   
   People living paycheck to paycheck, single mothers working multiple jobs to keep food on the table, young people trying to buy a home and even families working hard to save for their kids' college are all going to lose with the Republican tax reform plan. This bill is a disgrace. The GOP is negotiating away what's best for American families so Donald Trump can give a massive tax break to his Mar-a-Lago cronies, not the hardworking families that helped build this country.
   
   join me today by signing this petition to tell the GOP any tax reform plan shouldn't come at the expense of America's working families, seniors and the poor!
   
   https://petitions.signforgood.com/prote … orgood.com

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      wildernessposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Before I sign, may I ask at whose expense tax reform should come from?  I assume the answer is those that already pay many, many multiples of the average tax burden, but is there someone else you have in mind?

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         ptosisposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         Glad you asked:
         
         
         
         From early in the 2016 presidential campaign, Donald Trump swore he’d do away with the so-called carried-interest loophole, the notorious tax break that allows highly compensated private-equity managers, real estate investors and venture capitalists to be taxed at a much lower rate than other professionals.
         
         “They’re paying nothing, and it’s ridiculous,” Trump said in August 2016. “These are guys that shift paper around and they get lucky.” They were, he concluded, “getting away with murder.”
         
         The president has made it clear to the tax writers and Congress. Carried interest is one of those loopholes that we talk about when we talk about getting rid of loopholes that affect wealthy Americans.”
         
         Yet the sweeping tax legislation released by House Republicans leaves the treatment of carried interest untouched.
         
         The preservation of the loophole is only the latest and starkest example of how a policy that is increasingly attacked as unfair and unjustified by people on both sides of the aisle has managed to survive through the influence of its well-placed beneficiaries.
         
         
         Currently taxed under the capital gains rate,of 23.8 percent instead of for ordinary income, 39.6 percent, even though it is, essentially, part of the compensation that these investment managers are receiving for their labor,
         
           the loophole has become increasingly implicated in soaring incomes at the very top of the ladder.
         
         
         
         
         https://www.propublica.org/article/desp … ives-again

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            wildernessposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            Then you would change that 23.8% to whatever the personal rate for the specific person is in the hope that they are paying the top rate.  And this is what you would use to reduce taxes for millions of other people?  I don't think it will work - the gain of 11% (assuming the max rate, which is a big leap) isn't enough money to be gained to offset more than a few dollars per person for the rest of the country.  It also fails to recognize that corporate taxes are double taxed - something that has always seemed very unfair to me.
            
            Got more?

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               ptosisposted 7 years agoin reply to this

               Oh really W, did you really expect me to put out a 132 thesis paper on the entire tarball?
               I think not.
               
               This is your Q:

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                  wildernessposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                  My question was whether you expected those paying 1,000 times the average to pick up even more of the load in return for making the load even less for those that don't pay their share.
                  
                  It appears your answer is an unqualified "yes".  Is that correct?

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                     ptosisposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                     but is there someone else you have in mind?
                     but is there someone else you have in mind?
                     but is there someone else you have in mind?
                     but is there someone else you have in mind?
                     but is there someone else you have in mind?
                     
                     That was your Q. even on a forum , you attempt to deflect and change history.
                     I'm outta here

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      GA Andersonposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Hi ptosis, just working from the info in your post, an obvious question came to mind. You said:
      
      "People living paycheck to paycheck, single mothers working multiple jobs to keep food on the table, young people trying to buy a home and even families working hard to save for their kids' college are all going to lose ..."
      
      Speaking of Federal Income Taxes, the topic of your post, I doubt that many people living paycheck to paycheck, single mothers or young people trying to buy a home are paying income taxes to begin with. Well, maybe those affluent young people trying to buy a home worth more than $500,000, but bless their heart, if they can afford a more than half-million dollar home, will they really be too badly hurt by the loss of that mortgage deduction for the over $500,000 amount?
      
      So, if the victims you list aren't paying taxes, how would you go about giving them a tax break?
      
      GA

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         wildernessposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         I would, for the most part anyway, disagree that people aren't living paycheck to paycheck.  Sadly, I think it doesn't much matter how much is being earned, it's spent before the check even arrives.  If that's the criteria for not paying taxes, 90% of the country wouldn't have to pay anything at all!

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            GA Andersonposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            Oops! I didn't say folks weren't living paycheck to paycheck - I just quoted ptosis.
            
            GA

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               wildernessposted 7 years agoin reply to this

               Sorry about that.

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         ptosisposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         I don't understand why you think the following people don't pay taxes:
         
         "People living paycheck to paycheck, single mothers working multiple jobs to keep food on the table, young people trying to buy a home and even families working hard to save for their kids' college are all going to lose ..."

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            GA Andersonposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            Not taxes ptosis, Federal Income taxes. That was the topic of your thread.
            
            GA

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         ptosisposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         When it comes to all federal taxes — individual income, payroll, excise, corporate income and estate taxes — the distributions of who pays what is more spread out. This is partially because nearly everyone pays excise taxes, which includes taxes on gasoline, alcohol and cigarettes.
         
         on the flip side:
         despite making more than $1 million, roughly 666 households likely won't owe any federal income tax, according to estimates from the Tax Policy Center.
         
         Donald J. Trump explicitly acknowledged that he used a $916 million loss that he reported on his 1995 income tax returns to avoid paying personal federal income taxes for years.

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            GA Andersonposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            But we weren't talking about all Federal taxes ptosis, your topic was Federal income taxes.
            
            About those 666 households, would the reasons they may not pay any Federal Income taxes have any bearing on your point? Did the Tax Policy Center offer any reasoning for that statement?
            
            And, I must have missed that "explicit" Trump announcement. all I heard were folks speculating that the loss may have allowed him apply it to future years, (up to 18 years?), income to possibly avoid having to pay taxes for those years.
            
            Hmm... are you sure about that explicit statement from Trump? And what about that question concerning giving a tax break to those lower income folks that probably aren't paying any Federal Income taxes?
            
            GA

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      tritrainposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      I'm still trying to figure out what MAGA means.  Anyone?

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   ahorsebackposted 7 years ago

   The entire premise , that oft used liberal defense is always this ;
   
   "But People are Living Paycheck to Paycheck"
   
   So what the hell is wrong with that ?    Americans , some of us , have always lived or started out paycheck to paycheck ,    from  the beginning of America's first days  that has been part of the learning curve of personal finances . In fact , historically  speaking ALL economies are based on one painfully yet obvious fact . There are those at the bottom  and there are those who aren't  but there is no better education system than our economy .
   
   Problem , The top tier in income can't be where everyone begins .

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      tritrainposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Problem, once the disparity between the highest wealth/income people and most other people becomes too large then it becomes ripe for turmoil or even revolution.  When there are executives making 10, 20, 100 times as much as their lowest paid employee then there is something wrong. 
      
      And then to think that these same wealthy people would be in a good position to understand or commiserate with the poorer people is foolish (usually). 
      
      We've got a prime example with most of our legislature and certainly with our current president.

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         ahorsebackposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         All that you've proved is that you believe in the poor against the rich wealth re-distribution  dream .  A little info for the new and  generationally entitled , There have always been poor and rich people !

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