The Proportion Of Taxes Paid By The Rich Is Less Than Wealth Inequality

[Peacenik]

Here is my contention:

The Proportion of [ Taxes Paid By The Rich ] vs [ the taxes paid by the median tax payer ] is less than the difference in the wealth of the two.

We regularly hear people say the rich pay most of the taxes, way more than the rest of tax payers. This is often said in the discussions about how much to tax the rich. And it's true. More revenue comes from the rich than from the rest. Very convincing. Its supposed to be convincing. This is an example of a talking point disseminated by the public opinion shaping apparatus of the rich. This is why the rich pay big money into outfits such as Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute, Federalist Society, and ALEC.

What is not said is that the rich are so much more richer than the rest of us that most people don't even realize the difference. And they could easily afford to pay much more in taxes. They just don't want to. It's greed talking.

Here is a short video that does a really good job of explaining just how rich the rich are:



The video is over a decade old. The wealth of the richest has gone up by multiples more than double what they had when the video was made. Meanwhile, taxes on the wealthy have been reduced. It's not right. They need to be paying more. A lot more. The Republican party stands in the way.

Democrats are ready to tax the rich more. Why do Republicans defend the rich? Most Republican voters are of average wealth. It makes no sense.

The reason is because of the Powell Memo.

After Powell advised the rich to fund organizations whose goal is to shape public opinion to support rich corporations and oppose government regulation, that was when conservatives began to move away from the Main Stream Media and create their own echo chamber of nonsense, including Fox news. 50 years later, we have people voting against their own better interest, electing crooks and billionaires, and defending the rich who pay way less of their wealth into taxes than the rest of us do.

Democrats have been made out to be horrible people who are 'trying to destroy America.' Of course, that makes no sense because Democrats are Americans who love America and have never voiced a desire to destroy the land they love. But that's right wing bloviators for ya. They don't want you to really listen to what Democrats actually say. They want you to only listen to what they tell you Democrats are saying. Big surprise: Democrats do not say what the right wing bloviators tell you they say.

Democrats want to raise taxes on the rich, not you. If you don't have hundreds of millions of dollars, you're not really that rich.

Most billionaires are in America. That makes sense. The American government is bought. Thanks to the Powell Memo efforts, most voters support the Republican party, which is totally in the pocket of the rich.

 

[noonereal]

Here is my contention:

The Proportion of [ Taxes Paid By The Rich ] vs [ the taxes paid by the median tax payer ] is less than the difference in the wealth of the two.

We regularly hear people say the rich pay most of the taxes, way more than the rest of tax payers. This is often said in the discussions about how much to tax the rich. And it's true. More revenue comes from the rich than from the rest. Very convincing. Its supposed to be convincing. This is an example of a talking point disseminated by the public opinion shaping apparatus of the rich. This is why the rich pay big money into outfits such as Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute, Federalist Society, and ALEC.

What is not said is that the rich are so much more richer than the rest of us that most people don't even realize the difference. And they could easily afford to pay much more in taxes. They just don't want to. It's greed talking.

Here is a short video that does a really good job of explaining just how rich the rich are:



The video is over a decade old. The wealth of the richest has gone up by multiples more than double what they had when the video was made. Meanwhile, taxes on the wealthy have been reduced. It's not right. They need to be paying more. A lot more. The Republican party stands in the way.

Democrats are ready to tax the rich more. Why do Republicans defend the rich? Most Republican voters are of average wealth. It makes no sense.

The reason is because of the Powell Memo.

After Powell advised the rich to fund organizations whose goal is to shape public opinion to support rich corporations and oppose government regulation, that was when conservatives began to move away from the Main Stream Media and create their own echo chamber of nonsense, including Fox news. 50 years later, we have people voting against their own better interest, electing crooks and billionaires, and defending the rich who pay way less of their wealth into taxes than the rest of us do.

Democrats have been made out to be horrible people who are 'trying to destroy America.' Of course, that makes no sense because Democrats are Americans who love America and have never voiced a desire to destroy the land they love. But that's right wing bloviators for ya. They don't want you to really listen to what Democrats actually say. They want you to only listen to what they tell you Democrats are saying. Big surprise: Democrats do not say what the right wing bloviators tell you they say.

Democrats want to raise taxes on the rich, not you. If you don't have hundreds of millions of dollars, you're not really that rich.

Most billionaires are in America. That makes sense. The American government is bought. Thanks to the Powell Memo efforts, most voters support the Republican party, which is totally in the pocket of the rich.

Way to many words to explain what few realize.
Why they don't? GOP messages better.

 

[DrewPaul]

I'm in favor of a flat tax or a POS tax. But it appears the current method is a cottage industry.

 

[Craig234]

Most billionaires are in America.

Oddly one Wikipedia page says the US has 813 and China 406, while Google's AI says China has 814 to US 800; and another Wikipedia page agrees with the AI. All are 2024 data.

 

[Peacenik]

Way to many words to explain what few realize.
Why they don't? GOP messages better.

Psssst. It's not just the GOP. It's big freaking money and all those public opinion shaping organizations they pay for!

Of course GOP messaging works better. The palate has been primed by big money to receive those GOP messages.

Just like that little soundbyte about the rich paying more taxes than the rest. Hint: That one did not come from average wealth. It came from big money.

 

[noonereal]

Psssst. It's not just the GOP. It's big freaking money and all those public opinion shaping organizations they pay for!

Of course GOP messaging works better. The palate has been primed by big money to receive those GOP messages.

Just like that little soundbyte about the rich paying more taxes than the rest. Hint: That one did not come from average wealth. It came from big money.

Hint, you are repeating yourself.

 

[Peacenik]

Oddly one Wikipedia page says the US has 813 and China 406, while Google's AI says China has 814 to US 800; and another Wikipedia page agrees with the AI. All are 2024 data.

If we could manage to run our government independent from big money it would be unique. Most governments are bought. The Chinese are no exception. And their government is definitely into mind-control.

 

[Peacenik]

Hint, you are repeating yourself.

But is anyone listening.

 

[noonereal]

But is anyone listening.

Nope

 

[Jay59]

But is anyone listening.

They are listing and consider you greedy.

The top 10% pay 75% of the taxes and the bottom 50% pay less than 10%. That's already unfair but you complain it's not enough.

 

[trouble13]

Here is my contention:

The Proportion of [ Taxes Paid By The Rich ] vs [ the taxes paid by the median tax payer ] is less than the difference in the wealth of the two.

We regularly hear people say the rich pay most of the taxes, way more than the rest of tax payers. This is often said in the discussions about how much to tax the rich. And it's true. More revenue comes from the rich than from the rest. Very convincing. Its supposed to be convincing. This is an example of a talking point disseminated by the public opinion shaping apparatus of the rich. This is why the rich pay big money into outfits such as Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute, Federalist Society, and ALEC.

What is not said is that the rich are so much more richer than the rest of us that most people don't even realize the difference. And they could easily afford to pay much more in taxes. They just don't want to. It's greed talking.

Here is a short video that does a really good job of explaining just how rich the rich are:



The video is over a decade old. The wealth of the richest has gone up by multiples more than double what they had when the video was made. Meanwhile, taxes on the wealthy have been reduced. It's not right. They need to be paying more. A lot more. The Republican party stands in the way.

Democrats are ready to tax the rich more. Why do Republicans defend the rich? Most Republican voters are of average wealth. It makes no sense.

The reason is because of the Powell Memo.

After Powell advised the rich to fund organizations whose goal is to shape public opinion to support rich corporations and oppose government regulation, that was when conservatives began to move away from the Main Stream Media and create their own echo chamber of nonsense, including Fox news. 50 years later, we have people voting against their own better interest, electing crooks and billionaires, and defending the rich who pay way less of their wealth into taxes than the rest of us do.

Democrats have been made out to be horrible people who are 'trying to destroy America.' Of course, that makes no sense because Democrats are Americans who love America and have never voiced a desire to destroy the land they love. But that's right wing bloviators for ya. They don't want you to really listen to what Democrats actually say. They want you to only listen to what they tell you Democrats are saying. Big surprise: Democrats do not say what the right wing bloviators tell you they say.

Democrats want to raise taxes on the rich, not you. If you don't have hundreds of millions of dollars, you're not really that rich.

Most billionaires are in America. That makes sense. The American government is bought. Thanks to the Powell Memo efforts, most voters support the Republican party, which is totally in the pocket of the rich.

Most people do not pay any income tax and a large portion of people get a larger return than what they contributed. Are those people paying their fair share? Are you upset over that too? Do you start threads delegating them too or is it that you are jealous of those that have more than you so you feel they need to try to convince everyone that we should be mad them too?

 

[ttwtt78640]

Here is my contention:

The Proportion of [ Taxes Paid By The Rich ] vs [ the taxes paid by the median tax payer ] is less than the difference in the wealth of the two.

We regularly hear people say the rich pay most of the taxes, way more than the rest of tax payers. This is often said in the discussions about how much to tax the rich. And it's true. More revenue comes from the rich than from the rest. Very convincing. Its supposed to be convincing. This is an example of a talking point disseminated by the public opinion shaping apparatus of the rich. This is why the rich pay big money into outfits such as Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute, Federalist Society, and ALEC.

What is not said is that the rich are so much more richer than the rest of us that most people don't even realize the difference. And they could easily afford to pay much more in taxes. They just don't want to. It's greed talking.

Here is a short video that does a really good job of explaining just how rich the rich are:



The video is over a decade old. The wealth of the richest has gone up by multiples more than double what they had when the video was made. Meanwhile, taxes on the wealthy have been reduced. It's not right. They need to be paying more. A lot more. The Republican party stands in the way.

Democrats are ready to tax the rich more. Why do Republicans defend the rich? Most Republican voters are of average wealth. It makes no sense.

The reason is because of the Powell Memo.

After Powell advised the rich to fund organizations whose goal is to shape public opinion to support rich corporations and oppose government regulation, that was when conservatives began to move away from the Main Stream Media and create their own echo chamber of nonsense, including Fox news. 50 years later, we have people voting against their own better interest, electing crooks and billionaires, and defending the rich who pay way less of their wealth into taxes than the rest of us do.

Democrats have been made out to be horrible people who are 'trying to destroy America.' Of course, that makes no sense because Democrats are Americans who love America and have never voiced a desire to destroy the land they love. But that's right wing bloviators for ya. They don't want you to really listen to what Democrats actually say. They want you to only listen to what they tell you Democrats are saying. Big surprise: Democrats do not say what the right wing bloviators tell you they say.

Democrats want to raise taxes on the rich, not you. If you don't have hundreds of millions of dollars, you're not really that rich.

Most billionaires are in America. That makes sense. The American government is bought. Thanks to the Powell Memo efforts, most voters support the Republican party, which is totally in the pocket of the rich.

So what? The FIT is on income, not wealth.

 

[Craig234]

If we could manage to run our government independent from big money it would be unique. Most governments are bought. The Chinese are no exception. And their government is definitely into mind-control.

Mind control is part of modern governance it seems clear. China does it, North Korea does it, Russia does it, rogue state Israel (Much worse than Hamas) indoctrinates its people from birth, and the US has billions in propaganda infrastructure for the right. There are still better countries, most of Europe, Canada, and some others.

 

[Peacenik]

Most people do not pay any income tax and a large portion of people get a larger return than what they contributed. Are those people paying their fair share? Are you upset over that too? Do you start threads delegating them too or is it that you are jealous of those that have more than you so you feel they need to try to convince everyone that we should be mad them too?

There is no reason to be mad about anything. Particularly stuff that is largely out of our control and we have no responsibility for it. The trick is to be aware, properly informed, and not get angry about what a mess our corrupt government is. We have the power to change it as outlined in the links in my signature. I say don't get mad. Get busy!

I don't try to get blood out of rocks and I don't think the poor should be asked to pay any more than they already do. The poor actually pay a lot of taxes in the form of sales tax and property tax. Most of their income goes into rent and getting by. Property taxes are built into the rent they pay, and virtually everything they buy has sales tax. This benefits the merchants and landlords, who pay income tax.

I do not denigrate the poor. I'll leave that to Republicans and the rich. I think it is despicable and deplorable to kick people when they are down, as the poor are.

If 'most people' fall into this poor tax category it is because the richest capitalists have been so efficient at extracting the wealth of the populace and preventing the bottom 50% from building much appreciable wealth at all. Mostly, that group is simply raped for their productivity and is left with little to nothing to show for it. The rich, on the other hand, just constantly build their own wealth as a result of the productivity of the working public.

The super-rich have pocketed the wealth generated from the productivity of the nation. The nation is, at the same time, building great debt, The super-rich control what government does, so it's totally on them, and so is the responsibility of paying that debt, which has grown proportionally to the growth of the wealth of the powerful who control government. Let them pay for it!

Or does that make too much sense....

 

[Peacenik]

So what? The FIT is on income, not wealth.

Perhaps that should change.

 

[dmpi]

When you buy gas or milk, you don't pay a percentage of your income. You pay the same price everyone pays. Why should income tax be any different? We are all just buying goverment services. In a perfect world, we all pay for goverment services that we need ala-carte through fees, and also pay a fixed price for overall goverment overhead.

 

[Peacenik]

Mind control is part of modern governance it seems clear. China does it, North Korea does it, Russia does it, rogue state Israel (Much worse than Hamas) indoctrinates its people from birth, and the US has billions in propaganda infrastructure for the right. There are still better countries, most of Europe, Canada, and some others.

I believe America would benefit greatly if there was a huge sophisticated public opinion-shaping effort for the left similar to what the right has.

Consider: The right is told what to think, given talking points, indoctrinated from birth, and is still just barely in greater proportion than the left, which pretty much is left the freedom to decide for themselves what to believe, and just logically realize that the left makes the most sense.

That in itself is a pretty sad indictment of the right.

 

[ttwtt78640]

Perhaps that should change.

Perhaps, but that would require constitutional amendment similar to the 16A. IMHO, any attempt to legislate a federal wealth tax would quickly become as much of a ‘loophole’ laden mess as the FIT code has become.

As you and I have noted, congress critters of both parties are beholden to the donor class. Many see the numerous “safety net” programs as helping the ‘working class’, yet fail to see that these “safety net” programs help employers (job creators?) even more by allowing them to provide less compensation (wages and fringe benefits) yet still be able to attract and retain qualified labor.

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

Here is my contention:

The Proportion of [ Taxes Paid By The Rich ] vs [ the taxes paid by the median tax payer ] is less than the difference in the wealth of the two.

We regularly hear people say the rich pay most of the taxes, way more than the rest of tax payers. This is often said in the discussions about how much to tax the rich. And it's true. More revenue comes from the rich than from the rest. Very convincing. Its supposed to be convincing. This is an example of a talking point disseminated by the public opinion shaping apparatus of the rich. This is why the rich pay big money into outfits such as Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute, Federalist Society, and ALEC.

What is not said is that the rich are so much more richer than the rest of us that most people don't even realize the difference. And they could easily afford to pay much more in taxes. They just don't want to. It's greed talking.

Here is a short video that does a really good job of explaining just how rich the rich are:



The video is over a decade old. The wealth of the richest has gone up by multiples more than double what they had when the video was made. Meanwhile, taxes on the wealthy have been reduced. It's not right. They need to be paying more. A lot more. The Republican party stands in the way.

Democrats are ready to tax the rich more. Why do Republicans defend the rich? Most Republican voters are of average wealth. It makes no sense.

The reason is because of the Powell Memo.

After Powell advised the rich to fund organizations whose goal is to shape public opinion to support rich corporations and oppose government regulation, that was when conservatives began to move away from the Main Stream Media and create their own echo chamber of nonsense, including Fox news. 50 years later, we have people voting against their own better interest, electing crooks and billionaires, and defending the rich who pay way less of their wealth into taxes than the rest of us do.

Democrats have been made out to be horrible people who are 'trying to destroy America.' Of course, that makes no sense because Democrats are Americans who love America and have never voiced a desire to destroy the land they love. But that's right wing bloviators for ya. They don't want you to really listen to what Democrats actually say. They want you to only listen to what they tell you Democrats are saying. Big surprise: Democrats do not say what the right wing bloviators tell you they say.

Democrats want to raise taxes on the rich, not you. If you don't have hundreds of millions of dollars, you're not really that rich.

Most billionaires are in America. That makes sense. The American government is bought. Thanks to the Powell Memo efforts, most voters support the Republican party, which is totally in the pocket of the rich.

Make it simpler.

The people with 80+% of the wealth pay around 50% of the taxes.
The people with 20-% of the wealth pay around 50% of the taxes.
The "Taxes::Wealth" ratio for the people with the 80+% of the wealth is 0.625.
The "Taxes::Wealth" ration for the people with the 20-% of the wealth is 2.500.
The "Taxes::Wealth" ration is 300% more favorable to the people with the 80+% of the wealth than it is for the people with 20-% of the wealth.
But you should also remember that "Only in America can a person inherit millions and grow up to be able to buy a legislator.".

 

[ttwtt78640]

I believe America would benefit greatly if there was a huge sophisticated public opinion-shaping effort for the left similar to what the right has.

Consider: The right is told what to think, given talking points, indoctrinated from birth, and is still just barely in greater proportion than the left, which pretty much is left the freedom to decide for themselves what to believe, and just logically realize that the left makes the most sense.

That in itself is a pretty sad indictment of the right.

That’s quite a load of partisan nonsense, but you be you.

 

[Peacenik]

When you buy gas or milk, you don't pay a percentage of your income. You pay the same price everyone pays. Why should income tax be any different? We are all just buying goverment services. In a perfect world, we all pay for goverment services that we need ala-carte through fees, and also pay a fixed price for overall goverment overhead.

Good question.

Here is why income tax is not flat. It is because if we tried to do that it would either a) not generate enough revenue if it was affordable to the poor, or b) if it was designed to generate enough revenue it would make many poor people homeless, and would seriously hurt the lifestyle of most of the middle class.

The problem goes back to the fact that the rich get most of the wealth generated by the workers of America. The workers only get enough to get them to go to work. Since the super-rich get most of the income and have most of the wealth, they need to be paying at least tax levels that are proportional to their share of the wealth. More is reasonable, because the wealthy can afford it without negatively impacting their lifestyle. Everyone else has to give up some lifestyle to pay taxes. Asking most people to pay more taxes means they have to give up something they would otherwise be able to afford. It is not that way with the rich. They have extra money way above everything they normally spend on lifestyle. The extra is merely invested because they have so much they can't even spend it all.

The investments of the rich go towards more wealth extraction from the working public.

If some of it was taxed away and used by the government to further enhance society, it goes back into the economy. Everything the government takes in, goes back into the economy. It's worth it to have a well funded government. Government is how our society is organized.

 

[Peacenik]

Perhaps, but that would require constitutional amendment similar to the 16A. IMHO, any attempt to legislate a federal wealth tax would quickly become as much of a ‘loophole’ laden mess as the FIT code has become.

As you and I have noted, congress critters of both parties are beholden to the donor class. Many see the numerous “safety net” programs as helping the ‘working class’, yet fail to see that these “safety net” programs help employers (job creators?) even more by allowing them to provide less compensation (wages and fringe benefits) yet still be able to attract and retain qualified labor.

That's because Congress is bought. Of course bought Congress is not going to make employment laws that favor workers. Any new legislation will favor the donor class as usual until we get the big money out of government (which is in progress... )

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

I'm in favor of a flat tax or a POS tax. But it appears the current method is a cottage industry.

OK, the current annual budget of the United States of America is around $7,000,000,000,000 and the population is around 340,000,000.
On a per capita basis that amounts to an average tax amount of $20,588.25.
The average household size in the US is 2.51 people.
That means that the average household should pay around $51,676.47 in taxes.
The average household income in the US is around $80,610.
So your average "flat tax", then, would have to be around 64.10% for the "average family".
And then you do have to factor in the State, County, and Municipal taxes.

Did you have some other figure in mind?

 

[Peacenik]

Make it simpler.

The people with 80+% of the wealth pay around 50% of the taxes.
The people with 20-% of the wealth pay around 50% of the taxes.
The "Taxes::Wealth" ratio for the people with the 80+% of the wealth is 0.625.
The "Taxes::Wealth" ration for the people with the 20-% of the wealth is 2.500.
The "Taxes::Wealth" ration is 300% more favorable to the people with the 80+% of the wealth than it is for the people with 20-% of the wealth.
But you should also remember that "Only in America can a person inherit millions and grow up to be able to buy a legislator.".

We'll fix that in time. You can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

 

[Peacenik]

That’s quite a load of partisan nonsense, but you be you.

Where is the left-leaning apparatus to rival the big dark money funded Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute, The Federalist Society, ALEC, and many others?

I don't see it.

All I'm saying is it would be fair if there was such an effort.