You'd be surprised.

It's crazy how many people got themselves into absolutely insane mortgages because their line of thinking was basically like Drajecks'...that it doesn't really count, that they deserve to live in the most insanely expensive house that they can get and people shouldn't question it.

That's part of how this mess started, people with a $4,000/month income saying, "Well, our mortgage budget is $4,000/month!" and then later realizing, "Wow, ok, that's hard to pay."

It's also worth noting that cutting this "fat" won't help as much as people seem to think.

At my county library, we've cut the budget...which means jobs get cut. So we lose jobs.

The budget cuts also mean we buy less materials, which means we've had to stop doing business with some of our vendors, which is less income for them. For them, they're losing some of their biggest customers, which can't be good and probably results in them having to cut some jobs, too.

When people talk about just "cutting programs" and such in government, they probably don't think it through. Even a relatively "wasteful" program usually still means more jobs.

Rugen:
I believe you are not a bitter person, but you come across that was regarding people in the upper income brackets. I think you envision anyone in that bracket as smoking big cigars and driving cadillac cars (thanks Boston!) with loads of disposable income, and as I illustrated that just isn't the case. 2% of the population is significant, that is a lot of people. When unemployment was down at 2% would it have been ok to just stop all unemployment benefits because it only affected such a small segment of the population? Should people not be outraged over civil rights violations if they only affect 2% or less of the population? Percentages are a finicky thing, small ones seem to not matter at all until you are in that affected group.

I don’t want to pay a higher percentage than anyone else. I already pay more in taxes by simply making more to tax. I’m ok with that, but I don’t want to be singled out for an increase. You call that greedy, it may be a little, but I don’t think it’s different than anyone else would feel in the same situation.

As for a $3,800 per month mortgage, that is all dependent on where you live. There are places where shacks are 900k houses and places where near palaces are 250k. Is it fair to penalize people for what region they are in? I’d be happy to live in a lower price region, but I stay where my family is. What good is a great house if you are hours away from everyone you love?

Your illustration was pretty fail, though.



He's not talking about the 2% being unimportant. He never said that.

I didn't spend a lot of time to make sure the in between numbers were exact on my example. That doesn't make it a poor illustration, the important parts are accurate (gross income and net left after taxes and 401k) and they describe exactly what I told you, a small percentage tax increase greatly affects the net spendable cash.

As for the 2% being unimportant...read his post again, and critique it in your mind the way you would critique a post from Khan.

Except not...your example left the 200k family with 9,000 after everything. Which is a pretty far cry from the ~46,000 left that I came up with using the IRS calculator and a slightly above average state tax.

In fact, one could argue that your "illustration" is pretty indicative of the sort of deception that Rugen is talking about...making it seem like this 200,000/year income family is so beset upon.



I'm not sure how you can read his posts as being "2% aren't important." His point, in fact, has nothing to do with the importance or lack thereof of that 2%.

You guys are forgetting that this thread started with a worthless Glenn Beck chain letter.

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Binkee presents a compelling point.

You've all been trolled by Khan, who started the topic, yet never posted again. Well done.

You can attempt to paint my words as bitterness of a "poor" man, but you're wrong on that front. As a matter of fact, my taxes last year were in the very bracket I am talking about.



Where exactly do you think that money is going to come from? You can't cut enough to make it up. So is it going to come from the guy making 25k a year? Having been both homeless AND sitting where I am today, with many stops along the spectrum to here? Let me assure you, my "burden" is a fuck of a lot less than what people are bitching about. You can't compare dollar to dollar with the lower tax brackets because it isn't even close and you, quite frankly, should know better. There's a sweet spot in individual salary...somewhere around the 65-75k a year, where the game changes dramatically and those taxes you pay shift incredibly in their actual impact on your life. I believe it actually mirrors pretty closely what studies call the "happiness point" where you make enough that your decisions are about WANTS and not NEEDS.

So, if you don't want to pay your share, then tell me. What are you cutting? Don't just say "waste and fraud". Tell me what. Get some numbers. Because I assure you, you won't win this game. You can't cut enough to solve the problem. If it was really that simple do you think these local governments would really be choosing to go bankrupt rather than just cut "waste and fraud"? I shudder to think what is going to happen if the republicans wrestle control back and go back to their baseline "let's cut taxes even more to fix the economy" so-called "solution".

Asking China (and future generations) to foot the bill on your unwillingness to shoulder some burden is about as far from "American" as you can get in my book. By all means, go after waste and fraud, but don't kid yourself about what else needs to happen.

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Yes, as these local governments are actually not going bankrupt and there is no short term penalty for being insolvent, they have no reason to self-police. They can pile on debt and continue living beyond their revenue. If they choose not to look ahead, why would they risk their political career and penalize those who fund their office?

There are very few wealthy in the country, and it would take more than taxes to balance that scale. We're primarily debtors. As a country we're pretty delusional about fiscal class, wealth, and poverty.

Also, as I consider about 1/2 of the federal workforce to be irrelevant, I contend that they could vanish of the face of the Earth and we as citizens would see absolutely no change in services.

It will be quite awesome (or sad) to watch people cheer when, after doing absolutely nothing, we see the shiny TV face talking about how our deficit was cut by 2/3 in ~2 years. Unless of course we have to step in and protect the assets of the wealthy again.

I've never disputed this. I've even encouraged the idea that it takes more than one solution in my replies here, but part of that multi-tier approach involves those taxes. Would I love to keep more of my money? You betcha. Writing that check last year was really annoying (and even more so when I think about all of the ways Obama CONTINUES to fail me). Do I think that is the best approach right now to get us back on track? No.

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I'm sorry, how is lobbying for your own interest reprehensible? I find that feeling entitled to a larger percentage of my income vs your* own to be reprehensible. Lower taxes inevitably should lead to less spending. It doesn't now, and that's the problem. I'm about to pay almost 40% of my total income in taxes to the federal government this year (I moved to Florida this year, so only some state taxes in addition), and I don't even get nationalized healthcare for my wife, since insurance companies are unwilling to cover her, for that contribution. So yeah, I've got a pretty good reason to be pissed off.

*"your" doesn't necessarily mean YOU.

Now, when you start talking about the Tea Party tards (most of whom aren't arguing in their own best interest /boggle) and flat-out lying, I'd agree. Not necessarily on the issue, but the bullshit spread about.

Pretending this is true, (and I can't imagine how it could be), how can you advocate cutting millions of jobs from this country and still not see how this would hurt the economy?

You only prolong the inevitable with this line of thinking. It's like not pulling your money out of a stock by convincing yourself it might get better. In this case, it won't. Better to lose less money, and find a new more viable stock, than to continue to lose money until you have none left to reinvest.

That said, I think saying "HALF" is just a biiiiittt of an overestimation ;P At least for the short term. You could definitely hit that figure over the course of the long term. And you sure as shit wouldn't cut them all immediately. A phased approach would be best (think months/years, not years/decades).

That's brutally high; the combined tax rate (federal and provincial) in Canada on a taxable income of 250k is 35% at the low end, 41% at the high end (depending on your province). At 150k, it's 32.4% and 37.5%; perhaps I'm missing something but I had always been lead to believe that income tax rates in Canada were so much worse than in the States.

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Kuwen Furyblades
Hunter of Memento Reejeryn
Champion of Faydark

Taxes add up fast. If you live in NJ and work in Phila PA for example you might pay 33% to federal, 4.5% to philly, 6.3% to NJ state and then insanely high property taxes (most are over 10k per year around philly area of NJ or another 5% on average). That is just under 50% in taxes. After deductions etc, it usually ends up about 40-41% for a 200k family in NJ that owns a home.

1) Show me where someone making 200k pays 33% in federal taxes. I already went through this, but you just ignored it.

2) Ok, so you're making this fictional guy pay two different state taxes. That's probably pretty uncommon and not indicative of the average person in that bracket.

3) You can pick an enourmously expensive property tax area to make the numbers higher, I guess.

33% is the federal tax bracket for 200k in taxable income. ($171k - 373k)

Assume 200k income for a married couple taking the standard deduction of $11,400

Assume 6% state tax rate (Georgia's rate is 6% for example)

Assume couple owns a $200,000 house in their first year of a mortgage at 6.25%, which gives a first year savings of $5343

200,000
- 11,400
------
188,600
- 5343
-----
183,257

They're still in the 33% tax bracket, plus 6% in state income tax along with property tax based on the value of the home (the county I live in, a 200,000 home would have $2500 in property tax)

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World of Warcraft: Kallaystra, Gweila, Steakumn, Tarathia [ Feathermoon/Horde ]

and that assumes married filing jointly. Married filing seperately they'd be in the 38% bracket.

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World of Warcraft: Kallaystra, Gweila, Steakumn, Tarathia [ Feathermoon/Horde ]

It's not as simple as "33% of your entire income." when you're talking about someone being in the "33% bracket" as far as I can tell, and the IRS calculator backs that up.

1) I didn't ignore it, I told you the in between numbers may not be exact, but the overall example I gave is close enough to tax returns I've had. It's not fictional, I just don't remember all the exact figures on how the deductions went off the top of my head. The gross and the net I know very well though, and unless you suddenly know legal tricks my accountant doesn't, all your reasons why I should have 40k left in my pocket are the fictional part. I would love to be wrong on this one though! (but im not)

2) It is only 1 states tax, NJ. Philadelphia is a city, not a state, but you have to pay additional taxes to work there. This isn't uncommon, at least not in the tri-state area. Millions of people work in Philadelphia, and many of them live in NJ because it's the closes suburb, the burbs of Pa are actually farther away from Philly than NJ is.

3) NJ has some of the highest property taxes in the country. I'm not picking them to be tricky for this example though, it is simply what I know and am accustomed to. Mine are slightly above average for the area, but not by much. I imagine it is even harder for people living in/near cities like SanFran or NYC because everything costs so much there.

Ok, well, I'm going by what the IRS site and calculator say for the details you gave. How there's a $40,000 disparity between what you "remember" and what the calculator says, I can't tell you.



Yeah, I was in a hurry at work and just saw NJ and PA, didn't process it right. In any case, it's not indicative of the populace at all.



Again, it's hard to take "some of the highest in the nation" seriously for the purposes of illustration. Especially when the topic has really been about federal taxes.

Bov, look at the numbers I gave. I did a "taxable income" calculation for you, assuming the only deductions available are: standard deduction, mortgage interest and property tax. note that this also assumes no children.

They still remain in the 33% bracket and are still liable for state income tax. Even 2 children won't get them down another tax bracket. I don't want to get into stickier tax situations like pre-tax deductions for employer benefits and retirement, which admittedly could get them into the next lower tax bracket, but this is as simple as it gets.

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World of Warcraft: Kallaystra, Gweila, Steakumn, Tarathia [ Feathermoon/Horde ]

Yes, except 33% tax bracket doesn't mean you pay 33% of your income. Not even close. They're liable for state income tax, but depending on where they live it's non-existant, very low, or partially deductible from their federal taxes.

In the end it doesn't make a huge difference in what you pay. The $200k/year income family above, after tax deductions, would still pay (approximately) $60,000 in federal income tax on their taxable income. If all $200k were taxable, it would be $66,000.

At this point you're just being pedantic.

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World of Warcraft: Kallaystra, Gweila, Steakumn, Tarathia [ Feathermoon/Horde ]

33% is the taxable income on a single individual making 200K, not a couple.

Couples filing jointly can go as high as 209K and still stay in the 28 percent bracket. The bracket runs from 137,300 to 209,250 so they're pretty much stuck in that bracket as don't see them sheltering 63,000 in pre-tax income.

They will, however, probably be able to shelter somewhere in the range of 35K fairly easily with 401K investments, healthcare, standard deduction, etc.

So they end up in the 165K range of taxable income which ends up with a tax of 34,444 when you actually know how taxes are calculated. As a percentage of total income of 200K, that's a tax rate of 17%.

Stop watching Fox News and get a new accountant.

I think you're still confusing tax brackets with taxes as a percentage of income.

It doesn't really matter anyway because he's off by about 26,000.

I should have listened to Neesha a page ago and just stopped posting. Short of me actually scanning a tax return and posting it here (though I imagine if I did I would just be told how I am filling it out wrong or scanned it incorrectly) I am not going to discuss what I was hoping to get to. I wanted to get to a point of "I/we think you should cut back on your current level of spending to create a higher allowance for needed taxes". While I wouldn't agree with that stance, it is the viable discussion I thought this would lead to. Instead I am just getting theorycrafted to death. Live and learn.

It's hard for most people to have a conversation when the entire scenario that was provided as a conversation starter used grossly incorrect information. At that point, it's more of an emotional plea than it is an honest discussion.

I don't think anyone here is going to disagree that we need to reduce spending. I also don't think anyone that is looking at this thing realistically thinks we can get out of this without raising taxes.

It's high time that that particular brand of fiscal conservatives realize that we can't just cut taxes and expect that to result in less spending. The American people who vote for these idiots on the premise that they'll lower taxes are idiots.

Yeah...cutting spending when and where it's wise and practical is great. This whole political thing where the candidates just get up there and say, "I'm gonna cut all your taxes and kick out all the waste!" is just goofy.

Bingo.

Did anyone notice the news about the UK yesterday? Admittedly, I am on vacation in California atm so I didn't do more than scan it, but apparently they just cut the budget of pretty much every government program by 20%?

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I did skim that myself, apparently there had been much talk about it prior to the actual announcement so the people didn't pull a 'France' and go nuts.

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Kuwen Furyblades
Hunter of Memento Reejeryn
Champion of Faydark