Obama's Speech: Dysfunctional Three Ring Circus

[WhoWee]

That reminds me... after 43 Christian presidents, I think it's time for an atheist.

Surely someone was labeled as such - let's google - start with Truman?

 

[Char. Limit]

Surely someone was labeled as such - let's google - start with Truman?

Why not? But I'm reasonably certain that every President has been Christian (Allegations of Islam notwithstanding)

 

[talk2glenn]

Since multiple sources say that the CBO study found the largest cuts applied to the wealthy, I will risk assuming their isn't some conspiracy amongst the various news organizations.

Perhaps I'm not being clear. Let me try harder. It is almsot certainly true that, in raw dollar figures, top-earners will benefit more from any tax cut than lower income earners. This is not shocking or controversial - top earners have far more taxable income than lower earners.

The argument here seems to be that top earners not only netted larger real dollar gains, but larger incidental gains. That is, you seem to be arguing that the wealthy ended up paying less as a total share of all taxes as a result of the Bush tax cuts. This simply isn't true. I don't know how to be more clear than that.

Also, do not forget that the wealthy are never going to pay the tax rates on as much of their income as middle and low income people. (unless they're insane)

I'm not sure what you mean here. By definition, the wealthy pay much higher effective rates on taxable income than lower income earners. Do you mean that the wealthy have smaller taxable shares of total income relative to other earners? This is not true either. Per the CBO, the top 20% earn about 57% of all income, but pay about 70% of all taxes. The bottom 20% earn about 4% of all income, but pay less than 1% of all taxes. This is total tax burden, not just income taxes - the bottom 20% enjoy an effective negative income tax rate.

While the wealthy might pay a higher percent of tax, they pay it on a smaller percent of income. This reduces the actual percent of taxes they pay compared to middle and low income tax payers.

The Treasury data is on total income earned, not taxable income. The top 25% pay an effective 15.5% tax rate on all income earned (much higher rates on taxable income). The US average is about 8%.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

Why not? But I'm reasonably certain that every President has been Christian (Allegations of Islam notwithstanding)

Here's a list of the religious affiliations of the Presidents. Affiliation is different from belief.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_affiliations_of_Presidents_of_the_United_States"

 

[russ_watters]

Study: Bush Tax Cuts Favor Wealthy

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/08/16/politics/main636398.shtml

Though it does depend a little on where one draws the line, typically, that would be very difficult to not be true, since a person who pays nothing can't possibly save anything from a reduction.

That's actually a little bit of an oversimplification: the reality is even a little worse, since for the people who pay negative taxes, a tax rate reduction doesn't affect them, it only affects those who pay positive taxes. People in the negative are in the negative due to fixed benefits which are unaffected by a tax rate change.

 

[BobG]

The cnn political reporter Gloria Borger - commenting on the President's speech - said it's not idealogues - she said for the 87 House members voted into office last fall - it is theology.

She's exaggerating. Only about 20 of the new House members are Tea Party members, at most, with maybe a few more that are Tea Party sympathizers that don't want to be painted with the Tea Party label.

I think there's a total of around 60 members of the House that identify themselves as Tea Party members. A small gang, but large enough to have a significant impact on what happens in the House. Republicans can't push through legislation with only non-Tea Party Republican votes. Either the Tea Party has to go along or the legislation has to pull in enough Democratic votes to replace those lost by Tea Party members. Then, setting up the legislation so that you get Dems to vote for it usually means you lose more than just the Tea Party vote, meaning you need lots of Democratic votes. Boehner winds up in a position where he's trying to lead a moderate coalition of Republicans/Democrats, having to fight for the Dems with Democratic leaders, or he goes to the right and the Tea Party has bigger influence than you'd think 60 (plus or minus) could have.

 

[russ_watters]

Lets try some logic applied in reverse to see if we get consistency on the issue of taxes:


By most people's estimation, "the rich" benefited more than "everyone else" due to the Bush tax cuts. In terms of $$ per person, as Ivan pointed out, it's clearly true. So needless to say, revoking all of the Bush tax cuts would harm "the rich" more. Right?

 

[WhoWee]

She's exaggerating. Only about 20 of the new House members are Tea Party members, at most, with maybe a few more that are Tea Party sympathizers that don't want to be painted with the Tea Party label.

IMO - even though she's the cnn political reporter - I don't think she cares to be accurate. Again - IMO.

 

[WhoWee]

What is nothing but a percentage point to the rich may mean food for a year for a stuggling family, or a year's rent for a single mom. Percentages mask the magnitude of the disparity in terms of real dollars. What we should be considering is the pecentage of income needed to survive in the modern context. In real terms, tax breaks for the lower end of the spectrum barely amount to more than pocket change for the individual.

Perhaps we should re-visit what "poor" means in America. For a family of 6 - parents and 4 kids - the poverty level is roughly $30,000 per year. This is the point eligibility for benefits begins - given tax re-distribution to the "poor". We might need to move this to one of the threads on poverty - but let's be precise in our descriptions - please!

To expand the point:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4349065...lions-middle-class-people-could-get-medicaid/

"" President Barack Obama's health care law would let several million middle-class people get nearly free insurance meant for the poor, a twist government number crunchers say they discovered only after the complex bill was signed.
The change would affect early retirees: A married couple could have an annual income of about $64,000 and still get Medicaid, said officials who make long-range cost estimates for the Health and Human Services department.
After initially downplaying any concern, the Obama administration said late Tuesday it would look for a fix.
Up to 3 million more people could qualify for Medicaid in 2014 as a result of the anomaly. That's because, in a major change from today, most of their Social Security benefits would no longer be counted as income for determining eligibility.
It might be compared to allowing middle-class people to qualify for food stamps.

A percentage point for the 'uber-wealthy" is a lot of money - but where does welfare end?

 

[Evo]

No, no, no - nothing like that. The pro-Obama mania that swept through Hollywood was quite potent and might have pulled some of these folks into a "tax the rich" frenzy - which I would find ironic.

You're so cute.

 

[WhoWee]

You're so cute.

 

[mheslep]

Apparently a study was done and it's true.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/08/washington/08tax.html

I don't know how to search the CBO, there are a number of papers I found that reference the tax cuts.

Since multiple sources say that the CBO study found the largest cuts applied to the wealthy, I will risk assuming their isn't some conspiracy amongst the various news organizations.

Also, do not forget that the wealthy are never going to pay the tax rates on as much of their income as middle and low income people. (unless they're insane)

This was actually shown in an older thread about taxes. While the wealthy might pay a higher percent of tax, they pay it on a smaller percent of income. This reduces the actual percent of taxes they pay compared to middle and low income tax payers.

Here you are chasing some kind of rate percentage or individual cut inequality which is a red herring in discussions on balancing the budget. Tax revenue and budget crisis do not come about from an individual rate cut or increase, but rather the rate cut times the millions of tax payers who received it.

Senator Merkley is apparently sending out mail to constituents stating that the deficit is caused 'largely' by tax cuts going to the wealthiest

...that our recent annual deficits are largely the result of massive tax cuts on the wealthiest among us

i.e. that the majority (at least) of the revenue from the Bush tax cuts went to the wealthy as a group, as opposed to everyone else as a group. That's grossly false. If the 'wealthy' today are those making $250,000 and up, then the total wealthy/not revenue split for the tax extension in 2010 is shown here:

...Following is a breakdown on some of the key measures and their costs, based on revenue estimates from the Joint Committee on Taxation, unless otherwise noted.

Bush tax cuts: $544.3 billion. The package would extend the Bush tax cuts for everyone for two years.

The bulk of that cost -- $463 billion -- is for the extension of cuts for families making less than $250,000, including two years of relief for 2010 and 2011 for the middle class from the Alternative Minimum Tax.

The rest -- $81.5 billion -- is attributable to the extension of cuts that apply to the highest income families.

The estimates for the split over ten years have similar ratios.

The consequence of such cynical output by Merkley is that it encourages the mistaken belief that the US deficit problem could be quickly resolved if taxes were raised on the 'wealthy'.

 

[dlgoff]

The consequence of such cynical output by Merkley is that it encourages the mistaken belief that the US deficit problem could be quickly resolved if taxes were raised on the 'wealthy'.

Sure wouldn't hurt would it? You aught to come to rural Kansas and see us rich folks.