Tax raises?

[Twisted Intestine 0]

I don't think this is the right thread for this, but all the other Obama threads got closed.

 

What's with all the conservative media folk always saying, well I'll give you an example from today:

 

"Obama said he was going to raise taxes, and now that he's in office it looks like he's changing his stance on that!" - Some bitch that reminded me of Leena.

 

I didn't follow the election too closely, but I still heard Obama say more than once that he was going to LOWER taxes for anyone making under (500 or 200k a year?)... Anyways, for anyone making under some high amount that nobody I know makes anyways.

 

So where are they getting he said he'll raise taxes from? Are they just skewing that he'd raise taxes for the richies?

[AndrewTS 0]

He said many times he'd roll back the Bush tax cuts for those making 200K + to Clinton-era levels.

[Twisted Intestine 0]

Yeah but they like to make it sound like he said he wanted to raise taxes for everyone.

[JaMarcus Russell's #1 Caucasian Fan 0]

"Democrats are going to raise our taxes" has been a old and reliable Republican talking point for a generation. No matter what Obama does economically , the Republicans will scream bloody murder about taxes.

 

Anyways, I find it odd and funny that conservatives want to remold the party back to Reagan, as if the electorate is thirsting for a return to trillion dollar deficits, trickle down economics, and less government (which is odd, because if any party represents more government it's the Republican party). I hope they try to go back to Reagan and destroy themselves, because this version of the Republican party is batshit. I believe in a two-party system, but not when one party is so power hungry it would mind seeing the country go down the tubes (California GOP i'm looking at you!)

[Dobbs 3K 0]

Have any of them tried to paint Bush as being a great president? I'd laugh at that.

[JaMarcus Russell's #1 Caucasian Fan 0]

"Bush kept the country safe" is the meme the conservatives in the media are pushing. Which is so fucking pathetic and patently untrue it's funny.

[ZGangsta 0]

"Bush kept the country safe" is the meme the conservatives in the media are pushing. Which is so fucking pathetic and patently untrue it's funny.

"Hmmm, this memo that says 'Osama bin Laden Determined To Strike in US' doesn't seem too important, disregard that. Well I'm off to vacation guys."

[At Home 0]

Hey tax cuts will fix the economy, oh wait

[Spaceman Spiff 0]

Tax holiday! Don't collect any taxes for 3 months!

[Dobbs 3K 0]

I wish they would take a serious look at doing away with income taxes and going with a national sales tax of some kind.

[Cheech Tremendous 0]

I wish they would take a serious look at doing away with income taxes and going with a national sales tax of some kind.

That'll never happen in a million years. A sales tax unfairly switches the tax burden to those with lower income. I don't see that being any more popular or efficient than a progressive tax.

[MarvinisaLunatic 0]

In a related topic, I can sympathize with Geithner over Turbotax screwing him over. I just tried to use their free file online service to do my taxes and they were claiming I was due a $600 rebate recovery credit, which I had never heard of and Turbo Tax doesn't provide any info on it. Turns out you're only eligible for that credit if you didnt get a stimulus check last year, which I got. So if I had kept going with Turbotax (I decided to try another free file option which actually guided me through the RRC process and told me I wasn't eligible for it) I would have been in $600's worth of trouble with the IRS.

 

But, anyway..I made $4k more this year and actually got back more money thanks to my 401k and student loan interest.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[BruiserKC 0]

I wish they would take a serious look at doing away with income taxes and going with a national sales tax of some kind.

That'll never happen in a million years. A sales tax unfairly switches the tax burden to those with lower income. I don't see that being any more popular or efficient than a progressive tax.

 

A national sales tax would be a more honest tax that doesn't discriminate the way the tax system does now. You'd pay only if you buy merchandise that would be eligible. I probably wouldn't include food or clothes, but all other merchandise (TV's, cars, houses) would be subject to it. Prices for goods wouldn't really be any different in spite of the naysayers, that price is pretty much figured in now with all the stuff we buy right now. Besides, how many people would absolutely love the idea of no IRS to kick around? That'd be a good amount of money saved that could go to other stuff.

 

As for the raising of taxes Obama wanted to do but now has had to hold back on with the current economic situation...one of the first things Hoover tried to do to alleviate things after the stock market crash of '29 was to raise the taxes of the $250k + bracket from 20% to 55%.

 

Smaller government and lower taxes can work...but you have to cut spending to go with it. Right now the government is so bloated right now it's not even funny. Besides, while I understand people want the government to help out right now, relying on it is not a wise move. Look at matters such as Hurricane Katrina...if the government is inefficient in responding there, why would I trust them to get us out of this economic morass?

 

[At Home 0]

Small and big government rhetoric needs to come to an end. We should be talking about effective government. The big/small government argument is decrepit, throw it out the fucking window.

[MarvinisaLunatic 0]

Small and big government rhetoric needs to come to an end. We should be talking about effective government. The big/small government argument is decrepit, throw it out the fucking window.

Theres no way that a large government has any chance of being effective. Too much red tape, hoops and hurdles, too many people involved, etc.

 

Also, a national sales tax would be great, but I imagine at some point one will be instituted even though you'll still have taxes taken out of your paycheck. Most states do it that way and its just a matter of time before the federal government goes down that road too.

 

[Big Ol' Smitty 0]

You have argued so eloquently and effectively for it in the past!

[Dobbs 3K 0]

I would think that even if a national sales tax was very low, like say 1% on most purchases, it could raise a large amount of money for the government relatively quickly. Wouldn't be the worst way to get rid of that pesky national debt our fiscally conservative president built up.

[EricMM 0]

Why is there such drive for taxation to be "fair" or "equal" for all people?

[SuperJerk 0]

And yet, the issue of fairness never seems to bother them when talking about inheritance taxes. Go figure.

[Dobbs 3K 0]

Why is there such drive for taxation to be "fair" or "equal" for all people?

 

Yeah, I don't know. The basic idea of an income tax is unfair anyway. Trying to pretend their are ways to make it more fair for everyone is kind of disingenuous.

[Dobbs 3K 0]

Also, what do folks think about Obama's proposed stimulus package? Just seems like he's doing another Bush tactic...and repeating one that didn't seem to do much anyway. How the hell are we going to pay for this anyway?

[EricMM 0]

He's just doing Stupid Bush Tricks so that he can try and get a majority of Repubs to vote with it.

 

Stupid, IMO.

 

We don't need another taxcut, that last one worked SOO WELL

[BruiserKC 0]

He's just doing Stupid Bush Tricks so that he can try and get a majority of Repubs to vote with it.

 

Stupid, IMO.

 

We don't need another taxcut, that last one worked SOO WELL

 

The tax cuts aren't why the economy collapsed. You had people that were flat out crooks screwing the system over. Plus, tax cuts don't work if you don't cut spending to go with it. We were still spending and borrowing at the same levels. And right now people are more likely to hoard their money so any tax cuts most likely are going to be sat on and not spent.

 

[EricMM 0]

I'm not saying they caused the collapse, I'm saying they did Jack Shit to help.

 

People didn't spend them, they just paid off their debts.

[SuperJerk 0]

I'm not saying they caused the collapse, I'm saying they did Jack Shit to help.

 

People didn't spend them, they just paid off their debts.

You'd think that using them to pay off the debts would have help prevent the collapse.

 

BruiserKC makes a good point about tax cuts not doing much for the economy at this point, which is why I think new government spending (not on just throwing money at th economy, but on thing we really need to do but have been putting off, and things that will lead to enhanced productivity down the road) is a good idea.

[EricMM 0]

The collapse at least partially was caused, and is BEING caused, because people aren't buying as much as we expected they would. I'm saying that when we guessed two years ago what our growth would be in the next say five years, we made hires, expansion choices, as a nation. And now that growth has slowed or even reversed, those new hires need to be fired, new expansions closed. But its not that simple, because people got promotions or raises and such, and generally there's going to be more cuts at the bottom than at the top.

 

In other words, reducing America's personal debt is a great thing, but it doesn't help our economy at all.

 

Of course that begs the question: What is / was wrong with our economy?

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Also, a national sales tax would be great, but I imagine at some point one will be instituted even though you'll still have taxes taken out of your paycheck. Most states do it that way and its just a matter of time before the federal government goes down that road too.

What exactly do you mean "most states do it that way"? Only 7 states don't levy income tax, if that's what you're suggesting.

 

I'm not entirely sure I see a reason for a national sales tax either, given that government expenditures in largely populated or heavily urban states are likely to be significantly higher than in, say, Wyoming. I assume you'd also want to eliminate the ability for cities/counties to charge supplementary taxes based on their own expenditures, which is how big cities like New York City can properly account for their state tax burden versus that of Utica. While a standardized national sales tax might be convenient or easy to remember, it probably wouldn't be very efficient.

[ANKLELOCK 0]

I believe the conservatives are talking about how Obama was going to forego putting an end to the Bush tax cuts on those making 250K and above because he rightly has come to realize that the LAST time you want to put a greater tax burden on America's most productive citizens(most of which qualify as small business owners, hence the Joe the Plumber Mascot deal) is during times of economic hardship.

 

And Bush's tax cuts, at the expense of sounding like Sean Hannity, WERE instrumental in shortening the Clinton recession of 2000/2001 that Bush inherited and led to 52 months of uninterrupted job growth(a record, btw). If you think the current economic crisis is at the feet of just the Republican party and has anything to do with Bush's tax cuts, you are a blind partisan moron.

 

Bush Bashing, however trendy, is getting really annoying. I support Obama, I have high hopes for our country under him, but President Bush was NOT the awful guy or completely incompetent buffoon liberals successfully propagated him to be in light of the country's challenges recently.

 

Was Bush a great president? No. Did his administration fuck up? Yeah. But he conducted himself remarkably gracefully(as did Obama) during this transition period when he could have sunk to the level of those who revile him and who were shamefully booing him at Obama's inauguration.

 

This has been my Bush apologist post of the week.

[NoCalMike 0]

In most cases these tax cuts/stimulus packages are examples of throwing crumbs to the peasants in order to give the bread to the wealthy.

 

I mean, yeah a little extra cash in my pocket would be nice I suppose, but if the tradeoff is that the wealthy and super-wealthy don't have to pay the millions in taxes into the system that they owe, I dunno if it is worth it for the economy, but it is always going to be a hard-sell to get people in desperate need, to turn down some free cash.

[SuperJerk 0]

And Bush's tax cuts, at the expense of sounding like Sean Hannity, WERE instrumental in shortening the Clinton recession of 2000/2001 that Bush inherited and led to 52 months of uninterrupted job growth(a record, btw). If you think the current economic crisis is at the feet of just the Republican party and has anything to do with Bush's tax cuts, you are a blind partisan moron.

You don't think massive amounts of federal spending after 9/11 and the business cycle played a substantial part in the recovery from that recession?