To live or die for Dixie!

I'll concede that the tax on whiskey needs to be lowered damnit

 

I say a flat tax. To hell with the income tax and sales tax.

 

A flat tax can actually work and be progressive at the same time if you say exclude the first $40,000 anyone makes from taxes.

 

Then the majority of the population won't pay taxes.

 

If the flat tax excludes the first $40,000, minimum wage workers won't pay anything. That doesn't seem fair.

 

A lot of people don't pay anything as it is. $40,000 isn't min wage though, min wage here in CT with a high min wage is $16,640, pre tax, if you work 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year. But basically anyone who makes under $25,000 really doesn't pay federal taxes as it is.

If there was a flat tax on all income it wouldn't be fair. The progressive nature of the tax means that despite the 10% controlling around 85% of the wealth in the country, they pay nearly that percent of the personal income taxes collected too.

 

How about eliminating the federal income tax completely? Trim government, cut their salaries.

 

Hmm, I can go with lowering it, lowering a lot, but not eliminating it, the only true way to such a disparity of wealth be ok is if those with so much cash sitting around do pay their fair amount in taxes. Most people spend most of the money they make a year, the super rich don't as the fact is a person can really only buy so much crap in a year, a national sales tax wouldn't be as equal.

 

The law is never irrelevant.

 

It's relevant only to the degree you are willing to accept it.

 

Which is the point.

Taxes have historically been a way of the rich stealing from the poor. It's high time that where reversed.

 

Have you read "The Fair Tax" proposal?
Or for those with a Liberal?, Progressive?, Socialist? leaning, how about a 0% tax on income up to the median or perhaps average income, and 100% on all above that? Then the government could fund any and every program it wished and have enough to redistribute to all those who earn less than the government determined fair amount. Of course you might also have to pass a law disallowing emigration, or at least a law against the liberation of ones wealth.

 

How about just a sane tax rate for various income levels

 

And what would that be? I put forth "The Fair Tax" proposal as a good starting point, although many appear to dismiss it without even looking at it. Governments provide us with a large array of vaguely defined problems, leaving us most often arguing over solutions related to a problem we have yet to agree on. In my experience, it is best to first reach agreement on what the problem is, and then go forth attempting to find a solution that we can agree on.

 

The fair tax is not fair at all. It doesn't make up for the vast difference in wealth distribution. Everything from the upper middle class down spends nearly every free dime they have all year long. Sure the rich spend more too, but a person can only buy so much in a single year, and a flat tax on all items purchased again just hits the pockets of the lower and middle class in their buying ability. It's really not fair at all when the percent of tax revenue matches said demographics percent of wealth share.

 

Stop trying to associate liberal and socialist.

You'll be suprised how far you can get in political discussions when people respect you. And you'll be suprised how many people actully respect you when you don't make such silly stormfront.org worthy statements.

 

Although I don't view them as identical, I think there are many similarities. In fact, depending on the topic, and the individuals affected, I might be considered to have a liberal, progressive, socialist, or less than conservative philosophy at times.

 

Alright so conservative also equals fascist then

 

I don't view conservative as totalitarian, but it's damn close. It means applying YOUR morals to OTHER people, who do not WANT your morals.

*note that I'm talking in the modern sense of these labels. I don't give a flying fuck what liberal meant 200 years ago, because that's not what it means today. So because 200 years ago it might have meant something closer to socialism than conservativeism did at the time doesn't mean anything at all today. If you like small government and personal freedoms today, you should be voting third party, not "conservative".

 

Ok, so it gets down to "attack the messenger" and "ignore the message". I did not refer to either one of you, TheMadcapSyd, or RooRshack, as being liberal, progressive or socialist, although your defensive response leads me to believe both of you hold to one of those philosophies in terms you feel are acceptably defined. If you look at the dictionary definitions of the terms we are each tossing around, you might find that they each possess some positive as well as some negative connotations, which I feel tends to lead us into argument based on the negatives of those philosophies rather than give attention to the problems at hand. Have I not demonstrated this to be factual? If so, would one or both of you now like to see if we could define a major problem in a way that we could all agree on in it's definition and then attempt to proceed in attempting to determine a reasonable and rational solution? Success in doing so is best achieved by narrowing down, rather than unnecessarily broadening the scope of the problem. Note the use of the word unnecessarily. Also take note that what we are doing is an exercise in futility as we have no impact at all on what our government will do.